Nederlandstalige School Madrid (Hof der Lage Landen)
Primary and secondary school in Madrid, Spain
The Nederlandstalige School Madrid (Colegio Neerlandés, formerly Hof van Holland and later Hof der Lage Landen) is a small Dutch-language primary school in Madrid for children aged 3 to 12 from a Dutch-speaking background. It opened in November 1964 and is officially recognised by both the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science and the Spanish Ministry of Education. Its curriculum and quality are supervised by the Dutch inspectorate for primary education abroad (Inspectie Primair Onderwijs Buitenland), and it is affiliated to the Stichting Nederlands Onderwijs in het Buitenland. The school is in the quiet residential area of El Bosque, near Calle Arturo Soria, in north-east Madrid.
Teaching follows the Dutch core objectives for primary education, tested with the Cito final test, and uses Dutch teaching materials. Education is bilingual in Dutch and Spanish, with teachers teaching in their mother tongue: in the youngest groups about half the time is in Spanish, and from group 6 Spanish geography and history are added. English is taught twice a week from group 5, and pupils in groups 7 and 8 can take the Cambridge KET or PET. Classes are small and combine one or two age groups; homework is kept very limited.
Most pupils move on to a Spanish or international secondary school, and a few go to secondary school in the Netherlands or Belgium.
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Programmes
- Groep A: starting group for three-year-olds (equivalent to Infantil 3)
- Groups 1-2: equivalent to Infantil 4-5
- Groups 3-8: equivalent to 1º-6º of Spanish primary (ages 6-12)
Subjects follow the six Dutch primary domains, including Dutch, English and mathematics, alongside Spanish language and culture in every group. Classes combine one or two age groups, using classroom models from Montessori and Dalton education.
Admission
The school is aimed at children with a Dutch-speaking background. The minimum age is three (children turning three between 1 September and 31 December may start in September), and all children must be toilet-trained. Children under six should hear and speak Dutch at home; from age six they need enough Dutch to follow lessons, which the school checks with tests in Dutch.
Registration is by form and becomes final once the €500 registration fee is paid; depending on availability the child is placed in a group or on the waiting list, with priority for siblings. The fee is refunded if no place can be offered.
Language requirements
Children under six should have the chance to hear and speak Dutch at home. From age six, children need enough Dutch to follow lessons taught in Dutch; new pupils take several tests in Dutch to check whether joining the Dutch system is feasible.