Two Castles Story Time Kit

Two Castles is a picture book that introduces the chess pieces as characters and shows where each one lives on the board. It reads aloud in about four minutes.

This kit turns it into a 25-minute program for ages 2–5. Everything is free to download and print, and none of it requires you to know how chess is played — because the book doesn't teach that either. It teaches who the pieces are and where they go, which is exactly the part that works with very young children.

What's in the kit

• Read-aloud guide with prompts for each spread
• Printable floor chessboard (tiles to tape together)
• Printable chess piece cutouts, light and dark sets
• Piece name cards
• Crown template for the king and queen craft
• Coloring pages
• Event poster with blank date and time fields
• Social media images

At a glance

Ages

2–5, with older siblings easily included

Group size

Any. Activities scale from 4 to 30

Length

20–30 minutes (4 minutes reading, the rest activities)

Prep

20 minutes, mostly printing and cutting

Chess knowledge needed

None

Supplies: printed pieces and board tiles, painter's tape, crayons, glue sticks, popsicle sticks for puppets, and card stock if you have it.

Program outline

1. Welcome (2 minutes)

Today we're going to meet a whole kingdom of characters. There's a castle, and a horse, and a queen and a king — and by the end, we're going to know where every single one of them lives.

Ask the group: has anyone here seen a chess set before? Some will say yes. That's fine either way — nobody needs to know anything.

2. Read the book (4–5 minutes)

Read it straight through the first time, with these prompts along the way:

• The rooks. “This is a rook. It looks like a castle tower. Can you find the other one? It's all the way at the other end.” Recognition and spatial contrast in one question.
• The knights. “The knight is a horse. What sound does a horse make?” Reliable participation moment.
• The bishops. “The bishop has a pointy hat. Point to the pointy hat.”
• The queen and king. “These two live right in the middle. The queen wears a crown with lots of points. The king has a cross on top.”
• The pawns. “There are eight of them and they all have the same name. Let's count them together.” Counting to eight is genuinely age-appropriate here.
• The second kingdom. “Look — another whole kingdom, and it looks exactly the same. Except what's different about them?” Colour as the difference between sides. This is the one chess concept worth landing.

3. Build the Kingdom (10 minutes) — main activity

Tape out the printable board on the floor. Hand out the printed pieces and call them in the order from the book:

1. Rooks in the corners
2. Knights next to the rooks
3. Bishops next to the knights
4. The queen and king in the middle
5. All eight pawns in a row across the front

Why this order: it follows the story, so children are recalling something they heard four minutes ago rather than learning something new. Reinforcement, not instruction.

For a bigger group: hand out pieces first, then call them by name — “everyone holding a pawn, come and stand in the front row.” Children become the pieces.

Benefits: name recognition, spatial reasoning, following two-step directions, turn-taking.

4. Find Your Match (5 minutes)

Spread the piece cutouts face up. Hold up a name card and ask the group to find every piece that matches. Then reverse it — hold up a piece and ask what it's called.

Benefits: visual discrimination, vocabulary, early categorisation.

5. Crowns and Castles craft (5–10 minutes)

• Crowns. Decorate a paper crown for the queen or the king. Both live in the middle of the board — mention that as they work.
• Stick puppets. Glue a piece cutout to a popsicle stick so children can act out their own two-kingdom story.

6. Closing (2 minutes)

Ask everyone to name their favourite piece, then one last check:

Where do the rooks live? (the corners)
Who lives in the middle? (the queen and king)
How many pawns are there? (eight)

Three questions, three things learned. Send families home with the coloring pages and the board setup chart.

Notes for organisers

• This is about naming, not playing. Nobody wins anything. If a child wants to know how the pieces move, the honest answer is “that's the next thing you learn” — and it's a good reason for them to come back.
• Mixed ages work well. Older siblings can help place pieces, which gives them a job and keeps them engaged.
• The floor board can stay up. Libraries that have left it taped down report children returning to it during open hours.
• Programs this fits: family literacy, STEM and STEAM early learning, game-themed weeks, toddler discovery sessions, sibling story times.

Order the book

Available in paperback and hardcover. Paperback ISBN 979-8-9883436-0-8 · Hardcover ISBN 979-8-9883436-1-5. Available through Ingram. Bulk and library orders →

Running an event? Tell us and we'll share it — and we'll send a signed copy for your collection. Send us a message →