According to Noir (2002), the practice of chess seems to have effect on many cognitives skills linked to school achievement. For example, Anderson (2004) reveals that students having the highest levels of attention are those which devote themselves more to the practice of chess. Learning of this game would also allow to increase the capacity to carry out an abstract reasoning (Celone, 2001; Van Zyl, 1991) and the capacity of problems solving (Gaudreau, 1992; Celone, 2001; Van Zyl, 1991). Research also reveals that the practice of chess helps to develop visuo-spatial skills (Brandefine, 2003; Smith, 1998; Horgan, 1988). In addition, according to Horgan (1988), the practice of chess would be more associated to the space skills than in the logical reasoning.

Several studies recognize the positive effects of the training and the practice of chess in a teaching context, more particularly, several researchers underline the effectiveness of the practice of chess to develop skills in the field of mathematics. Gaudreau (1992) showed that the students who receive a teaching on chess game obtain better results in resolution of mathematical problems, partly because they understand the problem better than those which do not receive this kind of teaching.

Although generally encouraging, the past research reveals important methodological limits. First, the sample sizes of the majority of these studies are often rather restricted with experimental groups varying between 8 to 50 students. The study by Gaudreau (1992) made exception with 437 children divided in three groups. Second, the dependent variable, on which the effect of the practice of chess is evaluated, differs largely from one study to another.

Even if beneficial effects of the practice of chess on mathematics learning where the subject of research for many years, very few studies seem to have focus on an extensive review of literature on this subject and no meta-analysis has been conducted on this subject. Meta-analysis is a method for summarize, integrate and interpret selected set of research works. This method shows some advantage on other review of research methods by imposing a structured research technique, coding and computing effect size and linking results to specificity of the researches. This method could permit to determine the effectiveness of chess program on mathematics learning.

The present study aims to apply a meta-analysis method to the past research on the effects of chess program on mathematics learning of students.

Methodology

The method used for the meta-analysis is based on the classical method developed by Glass (1981). The main steps for that analysis will be:

1) Collection of the different studies on this subject
2) Codification of the characteristics and the results of the collected studies
3) Analyse of the relations between the characteristics and the results of the collected studies

This methodology will allow us to draw a clearer portrait of the real effects of the chess game practice on student achievement, particularly in mathematics, by conducting a systematic research review and analyzing globally results of those researches.