You have an address in Flanders now, or you will have one in a few weeks. The flat is sorted, and then the first letter from the gemeente arrives, the neighbour says something over the hedge that you catch half of, and the language you need turns out not to be the phrasebook one. It is the one spoken at the counter, in the canteen at work and at the school gate at half past three.
There is more than one way to learn Dutch in Belgium, and this is a particular one: a Dutch language course of one-to-one lessons with a qualified local teacher, in the teacher’s own home. No class, no second student, no term to join halfway through — one teacher, one student, a kitchen table in a house not far from yours.
If the letter about inburgering has already arrived, or the NT2 exam is somewhere ahead of you, those are public routes, with their own class and their own timetable, and this does not replace them. It starts somewhere else: from the Dutch you are short of this month, and it stays there until that Dutch stops getting in your way. Whether the hours I arrange count towards inburgering is a question for your gemeente rather than for me: I would rather you ask them than take my word for it.
An intensive Dutch course, sized for one person
Intensive means something particular when the hours are yours. They go on what you have to say this month: the site meeting you sit quiet in, the phone call you keep putting off, the ten minutes with your child’s teacher. You decide how many before you start — ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five or thirty a week, all individual — and levels run from A1 to C2, so you start where you are. A concentrated week works differently from the same hours spread thin over months: one person hears the same mistake often enough to get rid of it.
Dutch lessons in Antwerp, and the rest of Flanders
Antwerp is one of the two transfer points here, along with Brussels — useful from further off, beside the point if you live twenty minutes away. Wherever you have landed, Antwerp, Ghent, Leuven or a village in between, the question is how far you will travel, for a week or for a Tuesday afternoon.
Two ways to book it
The first is the stay at your teacher’s home, from a Sunday to a Saturday with lessons through the week: you have your own room and you eat at the same table three times a day. The lessons are only part of it. What matters is everything around the lessons — the letter from the gemeente read aloud at the kitchen table, the neighbour at the door, the television in the evening, and none of it switching to English. A ten-hour week is booked together with activities or visits: with so few lesson hours, the time outside is what counts.
The second is lessons only: the same private lessons in your teacher’s home, without the accommodation or the meals. They can be one short intensive block, or regular lessons spread over several months.
You can choose the stay at your teacher’s home or lessons only; once I know your dates and the hours you need, I can show you the right option. Either way the teacher is qualified and the home inspected, and you read the profile first: which town they live in, whether there are animals or children.
If you are flying in from another country for the stay itself, I have written that story elsewhere. The stay in Belgium for Dutch or French and the immersion in Antwerp both start at the airport, and both are a week away from home. This one is for you if the address here is already yours.
Is the Dutch spoken here a different language?
No. What people call Flemish is the everyday name for Dutch as spoken in Belgium: a different accent, a softer g than in the Netherlands, a few words that are not the Amsterdam ones. The grammar and the written language are shared, which is why the forms, the courses and the exams say Nederlands. Learn it from someone who lives here and what goes into your ear from the first hour is the Dutch of the bakery.
When it is your son or daughter who needs the Dutch
It may be the other way round in your house: you get by in English at work, and it is your child who started school in Dutch in September and tells you every evening that it is going fine — and you cannot quite tell whether it is. The two options are the same for them as for you: lessons at the teacher’s home while they sleep at home, or a full week under the teacher’s roof.
If your child stays for the week, there are three things I don’t leave to chance, and I would rather tell you now than have you ask. The week is booked together with activities or visits, so the afternoons are out with the teacher, at a market or a match, which is where a fifteen-year-old actually starts talking; and they are looked after day to day by the host family.
Under sixteen they don’t make that journey on their own: either you take them and collect them, or, if they are flying in from somewhere else, the transfer from Brussels or Antwerp is in the proposal, with the name of whoever will meet them before they set off. And if they are under thirteen, they are never in that house on their own: there is always an adult with them, and it goes into the booking so that nobody has to remember it.
Putting a figure on it
What it costs depends on how many hours you want, how many weeks, whether you add activities or visits, and whether you need the transfer from the airport. I put the stay and any extras you choose into one clear proposal.
Here is a sample weekly price, but your final quote will depend on the teacher and home you choose.
Every stay is tailor-made: the prices below are examples. The most important step is to talk about your project so we can match you with the right teacher and home.
"Lessons Only" programmes are also available for learners who prefer individual lessons without staying at the teacher's home.
⚠ For a student under 18 staying at the teacher's home, General Activities and/or Cultural Visits go with the lessons.
What's included in your stay:
- Full-board accommodation at your teacher's home (private bedroom)
- Three meals a day shared with your teacher and, when present, their family
- Daily one-to-one lessons with a native teacher
- Cultural and everyday activities based on your chosen programme (cooking workshops, excursions, guided tours, local markets, outdoor outings, etc.)
- Total immersion in your teacher's daily life, from breakfast to evening
These are indicative starting prices and may vary. The final cost depends on the destination, length of stay, time of year, accommodation and chosen programme.
We can send you the teacher profile suitable both for a full-immersion stay and for a Lessons Only programme. After your enquiry, you can compare different options and adjust the programme to your needs.
Three things worth knowing first
An airport transfer or cultural visits can be added to the stay; they are charged separately from the stay.
I work full time. Can the lessons be in the evening or on a Saturday?
The hours are individual, so when they fall is something you and your teacher settle between you. When I know what your week looks like, I ask the teacher I have in mind before you decide anything: I would rather tell you what one particular person can manage on a Thursday evening than promise you a slot in the abstract. If it is the stay, the lessons are Monday to Friday.
Will my teacher’s Belgian accent hold me back if I need standard Dutch?
No, and there is nothing you would have to unlearn later. The accent in your ear is the one you will hear at the school gate, and because the hours are yours, the formal register — the reports, the forms, the letter you have to answer — gets its share of them whenever you need it.
My son is at a Dutch-speaking school here. Can he do this too?
Yes, and his lessons are built on what school is asking of him, not a general programme: the subject words he is missing, the reading, the writing he hands in. He can do that at his teacher’s house and sleep at home, or stay for the week — and if he stays, he is looked after day to day by the host family, whose profile you read first.
How we can find the right teacher
Once you send the details through the form, I can look for a suitable teacher nearby and send you the profile with the proposal.
