A College Go Course

by Peter Schumer

I have been teaching a fully accredited Go course at Middlebury College since 1986. By school regulations, it is a twelve week, writing-intensive, interdisciplinary seminar. The 16 students are all in their first semester at college, and I also serve as their academic advisor. This fosters a very close and friendly atmosphere conducive to learning a new skill like Go. Below I give a cursory overview of the course.

We meet for six hours a week (two one-and-a-half hour classes and one three-hour playing session). The students are given a detailed syllabus including homework and daily class schedule and are told to expect to work as hard as one would in an introductory language course. Class attendance is mandatory. Grades are based on four writing assignments, written game analyses, one test, Go playing proficiency and class participation. They can earn extra credit by attending additional Go club meetings or helping in promotional activities.

Students are expected to buy a portable magnetic set and several introductory Go books -- e.g., The Magic of Go by Richard Bozulich, Graded Go Problems Vols. 1 and 2 by Kano Yoshinori and In the Beginning by Ikuro lshigure, as well as Kawabata's beautiful novel The Master of Go. The students also attend a few evening Go club sessions and view a couple of videos and movies - including the Chinese/Japanese film The Go Masters and a Japanese documentary on the life of Takagawa (available at the Japanese consulate in Montreal). Middlebury College has graciously provided enough 9x9,13x13, and full board sets as well as a large display set and game clocks.

Since the course is writing-intensive, there is much time spent on writing, analyzing games and rewriting papers. The four papers emphasize different goals of the course.

• a technical manual with diagrams entitled "The Rules of Go."
• a creative writing assignment called "Go as a Metaphor." (This paper is the most fun for me and rewarding for the students.)
• a research paper on some Asian tradition or art form (as much for my own edification as for theirs!).
• an essay on The Master of Go or a review of The Go Masters.
• Some years I've also included a paper on the topic "Competition versus Collaboration."

I urge students to record a lot of their games and to review them afterwards. They just turn in four game commentaries. These include:

• an early 9x9 game with analyses from both players when first played early in the semester and a later retrospective analysis
• a recent full board game with analysis of the fuseki and three key positions
• an analysis of a 9-stone handicap game I played against the class
• discussion of a professional match

Students spend the first week playing only 9x9 games and the next two weeks 13x13. I spend a fair amount of time answering questions and even playing some simultaneous games. Basically, I ensure that everyone understands the rules and gets a running start on the course. Next they all write a letter home about Go for some writing practice and give Go some additional publicity. After that we move up to 19x19 games, and they mainly play one another. However, we spend a fair amount of time replaying games on the demonstration board and having the class make constructive suggestions. We also play a fair amount of pair and team Go as an exercise in viewing the game from another's perspective. Occasionally I have the students switch sides midway through a game. As an endgame exercise, I present the opening and middle of one of my own games. Then the class pairs up and plays out the rest of the game to see who can win by the most points, but the competition is always friendly.

Lecture topics include:

• Introduction and Rules of Go
• History: Antiquity - 1600
• Life and Death Busies (Three parts)
• Shicho, Geta and Snapback
• Cutting and Connecting
• Sente and Gote
• History: 1600 - 1868
• Fuseki Basics
• Shape
• Joseki (Three parts)
• Tesuji(Two parts)
• Handicap Go Joseki and Tactics
• Attack and Defense
• The Go Seigen/Kitani Minoru Game
• History: 1868 - 1970
• Tactics vs. Strategy
• Go Proverbs
• The Current International Go Scene
• Amateur Go
• Computer Go

I also have created about twenty class handouts, many of which are my own game commentaries. One of the most useful is 'Go Vocabulary" which contains about forty common Go expressions. Others are newspaper or magazine articles including the Sports Illustrated article on Nie Weiping and a classic Life magazine article dated May 18, 1942 which contains some good pictures of Japanese soldiers playing Go as well as Edward Lasker at the New York Go Club. Other handouts are Go World reprints such as "Go and the Three Games" and "Go and Intelligence." I've also included a chronological list of the heads of the four Japanese Go houses and a similar list of the Honinbo, Meijin and Kisei title winners. At the end of the course I encourage them to join our local club, become an AGA member and give them a reading list for further study.

The course culminates with a five-round tournament and a class banquet. The best students tend to be around 15 kyu at the end of the course, but I once had two students push each other to 8 kyu! I try to play down the somewhat natural fixation on rankings and beating other people. Instead, I play up the idea of self improvement and the notion of cultivating a lifetime interest in a creative art. All in all, the course has been a rousing success, and I encourage others so positioned to give it a try.

From the American Go Journal, Volume 28:2, pp. 6-8.

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