Thanks for the input so far. This is regarding DS6 (in K). He would like to increase the time he spends on chess. There are several levels of commitment at his school--short chess club, longer chess club, and a more serious chess club for competitors. He has done the first and second this year, but is pushing for all 3. That would be three afternoons per week (I think about 7 hours? might actually be more 8-9, since one day is very long) plus occasional weekends, though I don't think we HAVE to do all those (I will inquire). He would also like lessons with a coach. A lot of this desire is coming from his exposure to other children who do all these things...but most of these children are significantly older.

DS absolutely has talent and potential in this area, but I feel a little concerned about a child of his age spending so much time on something like this. At the same time, I don't really know what kids who are seriously committed to a sport/instrument do at his age, since DD has never wanted to get "into" something in this way and we don't tend to run in those circles.

The ultra-competitive aspect of chess does concern me a little. DS has gotten more "into" this part of it recently. Much is expected of him by his coaches. We had one hard tournament where there were tears and he took one loss hard. But he really wanted to come back to the next one even after I was very clear that we did not care at all if we did so or not. He handled loss much better at that one (although it was a "better" loss). He is currently mad at us for not taking him to various regional and state tournaments in the offing. Again, these have been talked up at his club, so to some extent he just feels left out.