Moving to the Netherlands with kids: the school checklist by age, from registering a 4-year-old to placing a 13-year-old, for a family coming from India

Moving to the Netherlands with kids means arriving in a country where school is free, close to home, in Dutch, and organised in ways nobody explains until you get it wrong. This is the checklist we give Indian families before they land, age by age, from the 4-year-old whose registration should have happened last year to the 13-year-old for whom the choice of school is the choice of the next five years. Read the row for your child, then the documents section, then the first-month section, because the one thing that matters most is the thing most families start too late.

Before you land: three decisions

1. Dutch school or international school. Free and Dutch, or English at €4,200 to €36,000 a year. The decision depends on how long you stay and how old the child is, and it is worked through in Dutch school vs international school. The fees, including the Dutch-subsidised international schools most families do not know exist, are in international school fees in the Netherlands 2026-27.
2. Where to live. Dutch primary schools take children from their own neighbourhood first, so the address decides the school. Choose the area for the school, not the other way round. Amstelveen, Leidsche Rijn in Utrecht, Leidschenveen and Rijswijk near The Hague, and Eindhoven's Meerhoven are where Indian families cluster, for exactly that reason.
3. Which groep or year. Dutch schools place by age on 1 October: groep equals Indian class plus two. The chart of every age from 4 to 18 is in the Dutch school system chart.

The checklist by age

Age 3 to 4: registering for groep 1

• School starts the day after the 4th birthday and is compulsory from 5.
• Amsterdam, Utrecht, The Hague and several other cities run a citywide registration system: the municipality writes to families when the child turns 3, parents list preferred schools, and places are allocated by rules that favour the neighbourhood and siblings. A family arriving after that round goes to the municipality's schools office or directly to schools with places.
• Elsewhere, register directly at two or three schools as soon as you have an address; popular schools fill a year ahead.
• Ask each school about tussenschoolse opvang (lunch supervision) and the continuous timetable, and about buitenschoolse opvang (after-school care), which is separate, paid and often full.

Age 5 to 11: groep 2 to 8

• Apply directly to basisscholen the week you arrive; a school must find a place for a child of compulsory age, though not necessarily at the school you chose.
• Ask how the school handles a child without Dutch: a newcomer class (taalklas) elsewhere for a year, or support inside the class. Both work; the difference for the maths is in which groep your child goes into.
• If the school proposes a groep lower than the child's age, ask whether the reason is Dutch or maths, and ask for a written review date.
• For a subsidised international school, apply immediately: AICS in Amsterdam, the International School of The Hague, Utrecht and Eindhoven have waiting lists at the popular years. What to do in the gap is in on the waiting list.
• Groep 6, 7 and 8 matter more than they look: the school advice for secondary school is formed on these years, and a child arriving in groep 7 has one year to show what they can do before the advice is written.

Age 12 to 14: the secondary years

• A child without Dutch goes to an ISK, the international transition class, for one to two years, and is then placed in a stream; a strong child can be placed low because the Dutch is not there yet. For a stay under five years, an international school avoids that risk.
• A child with Dutch from primary school goes through the normal advice and enrolment in groep 8, with the TTO bilingual streams as an option; what they are is in TTO schools in the Netherlands.
• Secondary schools have their own admission rounds in March; a family arriving in the summer applies directly and takes what has space.
• What vmbo, havo and vwo mean for the years after is in VWO, HAVO or VMBO explained.

Documents to bring from India

• Passports, the residence permit or the IND approval letter, and the BSN for each child once you have registered at the municipality; schools need the BSN.
• The birth certificate, with an apostille if the municipality asks for it at registration.
• The vaccination record; the Dutch consultatiebureau or GGD will compare it with the Dutch schedule and offer any missing ones free.
• The last two school reports and the transfer certificate from the Indian school, in English. A Dutch translation is rarely required for primary school; a sworn translation is sometimes asked at secondary level.
• A folder of the child's recent maths work with working shown; Dutch teachers read working, and it is the strongest argument for placing a child at age.

The first-term surprises

• No homework until groep 6 or 7, and a school day that ends at 14:15 or 15:15. The afternoon is yours to fill; what to do with it is in the tienminutengesprek and homework.
• Reports with no marks: levels I to V, and "het gaat goed". What the levels mean is in Cito score explained.
• A child who was top of the class and is now "prima", because the word problems are in Dutch and the working is graded in the Dutch layout; the mechanism is in my child was ahead in India and is now average here.
• Swimming lessons for the A, B and C diplomas, which every Dutch parent will ask about, and cycling, which is how children get to school from groep 5.
• The parent app (Parro, Social Schools) where everything is announced, and the class WhatsApp group where everything is actually decided.
• School holidays by region, three regions with different dates; the 2026-27 calendar is in the Dutch school year 2026-27.

The one thing to start in the first month

Keep the maths and the English at the Indian standard from the first month, in the Dutch order, with the Dutch words alongside. The Dutch will take a year to become usable and the school will describe the child's Dutch for that year, not their maths; a child whose maths has been kept alive arrives at the end of that year ahead, and the school advice, the TTO application or the return to India all become easier. A child whose maths has waited for the Dutch arrives average, and average is where the advice is written from.

What we do

We teach the children of Indian families across the Netherlands in English, Hindi or Punjabi, one child per class, in the order and with the terms of the child's actual school, from the first week in the country. Bring the Indian report and the school's placement letter to the free demo and we will tell you what the first term will ask of the child and what to keep alive at home.

Questions parents ask

See how we teach this, 1-on-1 online →