Against 1.e4, I do think too many young players run to the relative safety of the French & similar semi-open games too early in their careers. They miss out on a lot by making the switch too early. Richard Verber (may he rest in peace) taught a generation of promising Illinois juniors the Gurgenidze. Too many of these players plateaued early. There’s a time for the Gurgenidze (playing Fischer in Belgrade), but as the core of one’s repertoire? Yuck.
I’m not as strong & don’t teach nearly as much as many of the folks on this thread, so please trust their opinions more than mine! The “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny” dogmatism of teaching openings to beginners is suspect. But an emphasis on the open game (in its largest sense, not just 1.e4 e5, but Sicilians, QGAs., even Grünfelds…) before an emphasis on closed play still makes sense to me.
Makes sense to me also. But I’ve seen a lot of scholastic players play something like: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.d3 Bc5 5.Nc3 d6 etc. While technically 1.e4 e5 openings are often called the “Open Game,” the resulting position of the above line is not really an open position. Many scholastic players are afraid to take risk and play a real open game because they lack the tactical strength and opening knowledge to play such positions.
For the complete beginner, I and a great many other coaches teach the Italian Opening and defense. It is a symmetrical system that can be played both as white and black.
e4 is by far the most common opening (other than h4) at most scholastic tournaments.
This opening is a great way to emphasize Fischer’s key opening principles: Pawns
controlling the center, supported by knights and bishops, a castled and protected
king, rooks on open files, and rooks “seeing” each other.
Checkmate and different checkmate patterns are absolutely the next thing that should
be taught after how the pieces move. Working as a TD at a great many scholastic
events, it is clear that many of the kids simply have little idea about what the
objective of the game should be. Many strongly believe it is about who collects the
most pieces.
Next are basic tactics. With an understanding of checkmate, and a few tactical ideas
the player moves from novice.
Some questions on openings:
What do you serve with the Vulture, Hawk, Pterodactyl, Rat or Woozle?
Can only Boy George play the Chameleon?
Should the Lion only be played in the winter?
Will the Kalashnikov Defense be a part of the NRA?
How many Nimzovich defenses are there?
Is a Pelikan a species of Bird?
On what day of the week do you take out the Tarrasch?
If you play the Bogoindian do you get two openings for the price of one?
I’m with you. I’ve seen ~900-rated middle school students who could not win K+R vs K.
That is also why I teach them to NEVER resign. When he was in Kindergarten, my son had a lone King against an entire army – including two queens. His opponent stalemated him, and that 1/2 point got him into 3rd place!