In-person physics · Amstelveen · Haarlem · Uithoorn
Physics stops being hard when it stops being memorised.
A structured, in-person concept-mastery programme for IB Diploma and British-curriculum students at international schools across the Randstad.
Build conceptual depth. Secure strong predicted grades. Enter DP2 with confidence.
Students currently mentored from
- Amsterdam International Community School
- International School of Amsterdam
- International School of Haarlem
- British School of Amsterdam
Parents
In their own words, published with permission and anonymised at the family's request.
What families say
My daughter has become a fan of practical applications of physics. Thanks for making her like physics again.
Parent of an ISA DP1 student
GuruCool really did a great job explaining the concepts with real-life examples and made it easier for my son to get the foundations right. The instructor is very patient and brings a lot of knowledge and compassion to teaching.
Parent of an AICS DP1 student
The instructor has in-depth knowledge of physics and explains concepts very well. He periodically asks for feedback and always tries to improve the lessons to suit our child's learning needs.
Parent of an ISH DP1 student
What we deliver
Three outcomes every student is coached toward, in that order.
Three things a physics tutor should actually change
Grades follow understanding, and understanding follows a way of thinking that has to be taught deliberately. Everything in the programme serves one of these.
HL-level thinking
Not just numerical fluency — conceptual clarity. Students learn to reason from principles first, so HL grade bands become realistic targets rather than aspirations.
Command of Paper 2
Rigorous work against the markscheme: what earns a mark, what a "deduce" or "outline" command term is asking for, and how to write an answer an examiner can award.
University readiness
Depth beyond the syllabus for students heading to engineering, physics or medicine — so they arrive at TU Delft, Cambridge or Amsterdam already fluent.
Excite hydrogen and it gives back exactly these four colours in the visible range, and no others. A student who has memorised them can name them; a student who understands them can predict where the next line falls before ever seeing it. That shift, from arbitrary to inevitable, is what the programme is for. These four wavelengths are also GuruCool's colours.
Programmes
Weekly, in person, in small groups. Term-length blocks that run alongside the school year.
Five entry points, one curriculum spine
Each level is taught against its own assessment model — the 2023 IB Physics guide, or the relevant Edexcel, CIE, AQA and OCR specifications — but the underlying way of thinking is the same throughout.
Real-life scenarios first, formalism second. The goal is that a student choosing subjects for DP already knows what physics feels like from the inside — and can pick HL for the right reasons.
Forces & motion · Energy transfers · Waves & sound · Electric circuits · Criterion-based lab work
Full specification coverage with hands-on demonstrations and simulations, then paper technique: reading the mark allocation, structuring six-mark answers, and handling the practical paper.
Motion & forces · Electricity · Waves · Energy resources · Magnetism & EM induction · Radioactivity
The year that decides everything downstream. We stay one step ahead of school teaching across all five themes, and start the Internal Assessment early — while there is still time to do it properly.
A Space, time & motion · B Particulate nature of matter · C Wave behaviour · D Fields · E Nuclear & quantum physics
Consolidation and exam craft. Past-paper orientation under timed conditions, markscheme drills, mock-paper review, and targeted work on the topics a student's mocks say are still soft.
Paper 1A & 1B · Paper 2 extended response · HL extension topics · IA write-up review · Predicted-grade preparation
Mechanics, fields and further mechanics taught through experiment and simulation, with the mathematical fluency that A Level physics quietly assumes and rarely teaches.
Further mechanics · Electric & magnetic fields · Thermodynamics · Nuclear & particle physics · Practical endorsement
Most students can quote that 45° gives the greatest range. Far fewer can show why, or say what the dashed curve is — the envelope beyond which nothing launched at this speed can reach, no matter how it is aimed. Lessons are built to move a student from the first kind of knowing to the second, because Paper 2 asks for the second.
Method
The same four-stage cycle runs through every topic, every term.
From obscure to obvious
Most students who struggle with physics are approaching it like a subject to be memorised — more content, less understanding. The cycle below is designed to break that habit topic by topic.
Find the real gap
A free assessment session: a short diagnostic, a look at recent school work, and a conversation about where the confusion actually starts. Often it is two years upstream.
Clutter to clarity
Each concept is introduced through a physical situation the student already understands, then formalised. Real-life illustration first, equation second — which is why it sticks.
Work the markscheme
Questions taught against current IB grading and markscheme guidance. Students learn to see the marks in a question before they start writing.
Rehearse the exam
Past-paper orientation under timed conditions, so the exam hall is familiar rather than a shock. Feedback is on process, not only on the score.
This is stage two in practice. Before a student meets Coulomb's law as algebra, they see the field it describes: lines leaving the positive charge, arriving at the negative, crowding in the middle where the field is strongest and thinning at the edges where it is weak. The equation that follows is a description of a picture they already hold — which is why it is still there in May.
Where the programme is aimed
IB grade scale · 1–7Every student joins where they are. The programme is built to move a secure 5 into the 6–7 band — the range that keeps competitive university courses open — and to make sure a predicted grade is one the student can defend in May.
Locations & times
Three centres across the Amsterdam region. All teaching is in person.
Weekly timetable, 2026–27
Groups are capped at six so every student gets time at the board. Places are confirmed after the free assessment; a waiting list runs when a group is full.
| Centre | Level | Day | Time | Places |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Amstelveen | IB DP1 (SL & HL) | Tuesday & Friday | 16:30 – 18:00 | 2 open |
| Amstelveen | IB DP2 (SL & HL) | Wednesday & Saturday | 10:00 – 11:30 | Waiting list |
| Amstelveen | MYP 4 & 5 | Thursday | 16:00 – 17:30 | 3 open |
| Haarlem | IB DP1 (SL & HL) | Monday & Thursday | 17:00 – 18:30 | 1 open |
| Haarlem | IGCSE · Year 10 & 11 | Saturday | 12:00 – 13:30 | 4 open |
| Uithoorn | AS & A Level | Tuesday & Saturday | 14:00 – 15:30 | 2 open |
| Uithoorn | MYP 4 & 5 | Wednesday | 16:00 – 17:30 | 3 open |
Exact venue addresses are shared once a place is confirmed. Half-term revision intensives run in the October, February and April breaks at the Amstelveen centre.
Concept programme
- Weekly small-group teaching, full syllabus
- Topic notes and problem sets each session
- Termly written progress note to parents
- Between-session questions answered by email
MYP · IGCSE · DP1 · AS
DP2 exam lab
- Two sessions weekly through the exam year
- Timed past-paper work with markscheme review
- Mock analysis and a topic-by-topic recovery plan
- IA write-up review before final submission
DP2 · A2 · Sep–Apr
One-to-one intensive
- Fully tailored to one student's diagnostic
- Scheduled around school and mock timetables
- Suited to IA rescue or a fast grade recovery
- Available at all three centres
All levels · by arrangement
Found a group that fits? The next step is a free assessment.
Reply within one working day
About
One teacher, small groups, no rotating tutors.
Why many capable students still find physics hard
Physics is the one science that punishes memorisation. Students who succeed everywhere else arrive in DP1 with a method that has always worked — learn the content, reproduce it — and physics quietly refuses to reward it. The result is a student who works hard, understands less each month, and concludes they are "not a physics person".
Add the specific pressures of the Diploma — the Internal Assessment landing in the middle of DP1, HL rigour, a Paper 2 markscheme nobody has explained — and a subject that should open doors starts closing them. Students drop HL, drop physics, and quietly close off engineering and medicine at seventeen.
GuruCool exists to interrupt that. Every student is taught by the same instructor throughout, in a group small enough that nobody hides. Teaching is in person, because physics is a subject you argue about at a board. And the standard is set by what the student needs next — a defensible predicted grade, and the confidence to sit a competitive university course.
- Teaching
- In person, all sessions
- Group size
- Capped at 6
- Curricula
- IB MYP & DP · IGCSE · AS/A Level
- Centres
- Amstelveen · Haarlem · Uithoorn
- Languages
- English
- First session
- Free assessment, no obligation
FAQ
Still unclear? Ask it in the form below — it gets a real answer, not a brochure.
Questions parents ask first
When is the right time to start?
For DP students, the honest answer is DP1, before the Internal Assessment. Starting in DP2 still works — the exam lab is built for exactly that — but a student who arrives in September of DP1 has time to rebuild foundations rather than patch them. For MYP students, the year before subject selection is the highest-leverage moment: it is when a student decides whether HL physics is for them, and that decision should be informed.
Is the first session really free?
Yes. The first meeting is a diagnostic: a short set of questions, a look at recent school work and mock papers, and a conversation with the student about where things stopped making sense. You leave with an honest read on whether the programme is the right fit — including when the answer is no.
Why in person rather than online?
Physics is taught at a board, with diagrams being redrawn while a student objects to them. Small in-person groups make that possible: an instructor sees the moment a student loses the thread, and other students hear the question they were too unsure to ask. Online sessions are offered only when illness or travel makes attendance impossible.
How is the Internal Assessment supported?
The IA is 20% of the final grade and is usually left far too late. We start research-question shaping early in DP1, work through methodology and uncertainty treatment, and review a complete draft against the assessment criteria before submission. The work is the student's own throughout — the support is on method and rigour, in line with IB academic-integrity requirements.
My child's school teacher is good. Is this still worth it?
Often yes, and for a reason that has nothing to do with the school. A class of twenty-five cannot stop for one student's confusion, and predicted grades depend on that student's questions getting answered. The programme runs slightly ahead of school teaching so lessons at school become revision rather than first contact.
What are the fees?
Fees depend on the format and the length of the block, and are shared in writing at the end of the free assessment along with the term dates and the group you would join. Sibling and full-year rates are available. There is no registration fee and no long-term contract.
Contact
Every month matters. Groups fill in September and again after the February mocks.
Book a free assessment
Tell us about the student and we will reply within one working day with two or three slots at the nearest centre. No obligation, and no follow-up if the fit isn't right.
Phone & WhatsApp
+31 (0)6 30331662Voice notes and messages are fine — replies come the same evening.
Centres
Amstelveen · Haarlem · Uithoorn
Exact venue addresses shared on booking.
Office hours
Mon – Fri 09:00 – 18:00
Saturday 09:00 – 16:00
Sunday Closed
Term dates
Autumn block opens 7 September. Exam-year groups reopen after the February mocks.