This is a quick guide to a video series:
In this series, PlayfulSquirrel aka IM David Pruess examines what do after the pieces are developed. He shares his thought process along the way. I recommend this series after watching all the videos of How Masters Think: the Opening, and then watch this series of videos to see those ideas in action. Now that students understand basic opening principles, they should start guessing the PlayfulSquirrel's moves while watching, to compare what they would do with what a master does.
Note that some of these videos are longer than normal ChessKid videos since a few are live games.
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Here are links to the videos in this series:
How Masters Think: The Middlegame: shows you when to make a general plan and when to make a specific calculation.
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 2: makes it clear that once you identify a weakness, all of your moves should focus on attacking that weak point.
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 3: IM Pruess plays a game live and shows that planning which pawn to advance is a key middlegame concept. He also shows that at critical moments, you have to calculate to see if your plan works. You'll hear his thoughts live!
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 4: we see a game where, after some cool tactics, the focus is on converting extra material. This is a key concept since strong players have a way of making life difficult after you get ahead.
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 5: key concepts here are what to do with the central pawn majority and how to use the resulting space advantage.
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 6: another space advtange, but this time it turns into a deadly kingside attack. PlayfulSquirrel plays live and forces the student to calculate his sacrifice before he shows you himself!
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 7: in this insightful video we see how to play when your opponent doesn't castle. David also shows how you have be flexible and adapt your plan as the pawn structure changes.
How Masters Think: The Middlegame 8: in another live game, David makes a risky piece sacrifice but again manages to open us his opponent's uncastled king. When you don't castle against masters, bad things tend to happen!
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This series is ongoing, and we will continue to add more videos to it! Any chesskid should feel free to challenge one of our teachers if they want to have a game of theirs featured in a video.