Redactiesommen: why word problems in Dutch hide what your child knows in maths, and how to fix it

"Bereken" and "hoeveel" are the two most expensive words in a Dutch child's school life. Between them they open almost every maths question from groep 4 to the doorstroomtoets, and for a child who arrived from India they are the difference between the maths the child knows and the score the school records. Redactiesommen, word problems in Dutch, are where that difference lives. This post explains why they dominate Dutch maths, how Dutch schools teach children to attack them, the forty words that unlock most of them, and a routine that works even when nobody at home reads Dutch.

Why they dominate

Dutch primary maths is built on "realistisch rekenen": maths in real situations. The method books, the monitoring tests and the doorstroomtoets all follow it, so a typical rekenen test is a series of short scenarios, money, recipes, timetables, maps, shopping, sport, each with one or two questions. Bare calculations ("kaal rekenen") are a small minority. Even a table-facts test at groep 5 is often wrapped in a story.

For a child taught in India, where a test is mostly calculation and the word problems are short and in English, this flips the balance. The maths that carried them in India is now a small part of the mark, and the reading that they are still learning is most of it. We described the mechanism, and the result on the report, in my child was ahead in India and is now average here.

The five-step method Dutch schools teach

Most Dutch methods teach a version of the same routine, and children are expected to use it visibly.

1. Lees de som goed. Read the whole problem, twice. Underline the question.
2. Wat wordt er gevraagd? What exactly is asked. Write it as a short phrase in your own words.
3. Welke gegevens heb je nodig? Which numbers and facts matter, and which are there to distract. Circle them.
4. Maak een plan en reken uit. Choose the operation or the tool (number line, ratio table, drawing), then calculate, showing the steps.
5. Controleer je antwoord. Does the answer make sense, with the right unit? Is it roughly what you estimated?

Steps 2, 3 and 5 are where marks are earned and lost, and they are the steps an Indian child skips, because in India the question was never in doubt. Teaching a child to write the phrase in step 2 and the estimate in step 5 changes their score before their maths changes at all.

The forty words of maths Dutch

Most redactiesommen use a small vocabulary. Learn these and the majority of problems become readable.

Question words: hoeveel (how many, how much), bereken (calculate), hoe lang (how long), hoe laat (what time), hoe ver (how far), hoe zwaar (how heavy), hoeveel blijft er over (how much is left).

Operations in disguise: samen (together), in totaal (in total), erbij (added), eraf (taken away), keer (times), per (per, each), elk / elke / ieder (each), gedeeld door (divided by), verdelen (share out), het verschil (the difference), meer dan (more than), minder dan (less than), twee keer zoveel (twice as many), de helft (half), een kwart (a quarter).

Money and shopping: kost (costs), betaalt (pays), wisselgeld / terugkrijgen (change), korting (discount), procent (percent), aanbieding (offer), prijs (price).

Measure and time: lengte (length), breedte (width), oppervlakte (area), omtrek (perimeter), gewicht (weight), inhoud (capacity), afstand (distance), snelheid (speed), duurt (lasts), vertrekt / komt aan (departs / arrives), over (past, as in "kwart over").

Data and ratio: gemiddeld (average), verhouding (ratio), schaal (scale), tabel (table), grafiek (graph), ongeveer (roughly), schatten (estimate).

Put this list on the fridge. A child who knows it can read a groep 6 test; a child who does not is guessing the operation from the numbers.

The types that come up most

• Money and change. Multiplication then subtraction, in euros and cents. The Dutch write €2,45 with a comma; children from India misread it as 245.
• Discount and percentage. "20% korting op €45" and, from groep 7, the reverse: the sale price is €36 after 20 percent off, what was the original price. The ratio table is the expected tool.
• Ratio and recipes. "Voor 4 personen heb je 300 g rijst nodig. Hoeveel voor 10 personen?" Ratio table again.
• Time and timetables. Reading a bus or train table, durations across the hour, the 24-hour clock.
• Measurement and scale. Metres to centimetres, a map scale of 1:50,000, area of a room from a plan.
• Averages and tables. Reading a table of data, computing a mean, comparing.

Each type has one or two standard tools and one or two standard traps, and once a child has seen fifteen of each type, the type is recognised before the Dutch is fully read.

A routine for a family that does not read Dutch

Ten minutes, three times a week, with the school's own method book or the practice material from the school's test provider.

1. The child reads the problem aloud in Dutch.
2. The child translates it into English, Hindi or Punjabi, using the fridge list. The parent checks the translation makes sense as a story, not the maths.
3. The child writes step 2 (what is asked) and step 3 (which numbers) in the Dutch method's format.
4. The child solves it, showing working the Dutch way.
5. The parent asks "does that answer make sense?" and the child estimates.

Parents do not need to understand the Dutch. They need to insist on steps 2, 3 and 5. Within a term the child stops guessing operations, and the Cito rekenen score, which was hiding the maths, starts to show it. If the reading itself is the wall, the deeper fix is in begrijpend lezen, and a Dutch-speaking tutor is the right spend.

What we do

In our Dutch-school classes the redactiesommen are the bridge between the maths and the score. We teach the maths in English at a stretch level, we teach the five-step method and the Dutch tools the school grades, and we work through translated Dutch-style problems of every type above, with the vocabulary alongside, so that by the time the child meets the same problem in Dutch the shape is familiar and only the reading is new. We do not teach Dutch, and we tell families when that is the bigger gap.

Bring the last rekenen test to the free placement demo. If the wrong answers become right once translated, you have your diagnosis, and it is the good one.

Questions parents ask

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