We'd like to use analytics cookies to count visits and see where people click, so we can make AltEd better. Nothing you read or type is recorded. Privacy policy
Build a subject's whole curriculum from the exam board's own specification — every topic and taught statement, with a time estimate — paced across the dates you actually have. A GCSE in one year, an A level in one instead of two: you set the period, AltEd lays the content across it.
What it does
A curriculum plan takes one official specification (for example Pearson Edexcel's International GCSE in Mathematics A, code 4MA1, Issue 2) and turns it into a week-by-week plan for one learner:
Ready to follow along in the app?
No password, no card — a magic link and you're in.
Every theme, topic and statement the board says learners should be taught, in the board's own words, with the board's notes and examples.
A time estimate for each statement, rolled up into each topic and theme, so you can see how big "Algebra" really is before you start.
A week for every statement, worked out from your start date, end date and the hours a week you can give the subject.
A fit check — whether the content fits the period at that pace, and what to change if it doesn't.
A status per statement — Pending, In progress, Completed, with the days it was started and completed — so the plan becomes your record of what has been covered, and when.
Plans are built from a catalogue of official specifications. Each entry records the board, the qualification code, the issue (version) and links to the board's own page and document, so you always know exactly which specification a plan was built from. When a board publishes a newer issue, your existing plan is left alone and marked so you know.
For primary (Key Stages 1 and 2) and Key Stage 3, where no exam board publishes a specification, the catalogue holds Oak National Academy's programmes instead: a theme per year, a topic per unit in Oak's sequence, and a statement per lesson, each linked to its slides, worksheet, video and quiz on Oak. Every compulsory primary subject is there, for Key Stages 1 and 2: English, maths, science, art and design, computing, design and technology (with cooking and nutrition as its own specification, as Oak presents it), geography, history, music and physical education, with French and Spanish for Key Stage 2 — plus religious education and relationships, sex and health education. Key Stage 3 has all of those for Years 7–9, with German and citizenship too, and any other Oak subject can be imported (see Add a specification the catalogue doesn't have). A subject Oak teaches in strands keeps them, tagged beside each unit's title in Oak's order through the year: English's reading, writing & oracy, grammar, spelling, handwriting and vocabulary; science's biology, chemistry and physics (a unit can be more than one); religious education's theology, philosophy and social science. PE's swimming units sit in the years Oak places them.
Under each Oak unit, National curriculum opens the statements from the national curriculum that the unit teaches towards, as Oak maps them — a guide to what the unit is for, not more things to tick off. Religious education isn't part of the national curriculum, so its units have none.
Each lesson is timed as Oak plans that subject — the plan's summary quotes Oak's guidance. At Key Stage 1 most subjects are about 40 minutes a lesson; at Key Stage 2 English is 50 minutes, maths, science, art, history, RE and RSHE 55 (Oak's "50 minutes to an hour"), computing and geography an hour, design and technology 40, cooking and nutrition 55, and French and Spanish 30. At Key Stage 3 most subjects are 55 minutes, and science, geography and design and technology an hour; Oak doesn't give English or computing a Key Stage 3 length, so they take 55 minutes and an hour. Music and PE are about an hour throughout. Oak also says how many lessons a week it has in mind — English over 7 a week at Key Stage 2 and 4 at Key Stage 3, science two at Key Stage 2 and three at Key Stage 3, languages, history and geography two at Key Stage 3, most other subjects one, PE two — which is a good guide for the hours a week you give each plan. Where Oak offers a unit in versions — two ways into handwriting, or a choice of topic for a report — the plan follows the first, and the unit's notes and links name the others.
Already have your own plan for the year — a targets sheet, a list of topics for each subject, a spreadsheet, or a page in your diary you can photograph? Import my own curriculum reads it into a plan for each subject and one timetable for them all (see Import my own curriculum below).
Plans are personal to you: each guardian and each provider builds their own. Nobody else sees or edits yours.
Where to find it
Navigation: Curriculum builder — under Curriculum for a provider, Learning for an administrator
URL: /dashboard/curriculum-builder
Import (top of the Curriculum builder) opens a menu of the three ways to bring a curriculum in: Import from Oak (free), and — in AI violet, because they use AI credits — Import a specification and Import my own curriculum (/dashboard/curriculum-builder/import, also on the builder's empty page). New plan lists the same three at the top, for when the catalogue hasn't got what you need.
Week by week (every subject together): the Your plans | Week by week switch at the top of the Curriculum builder, Curriculum (or Week by week) on a learner's card on Home, or See … subjects together, week by week on a plan's By week — /dashboard/curriculum-builder/weeks
Step by step
Build a plan
Go to Curriculum builder and click New plan.
Learner & level — choose a learner (optional) and the level you're working towards. Levels with no specification in the catalogue yet are shown but can't be chosen.
Subject & board — pick the subject, then the exam board. Only combinations the catalogue actually holds are offered.
Specification — pick the issue of the specification (the newest is selected for you) and, where the subject has tiers, the tier. For Edexcel IGCSE Maths, Foundation leaves out the statements marked (H); Higher includes everything. An Oak National Academy key stage covers several years, so it asks Which years? — tick the year (or years) this plan is for. The learner's own year is ticked for you when AltEd can tell it: from the year group on their details ("Year 2"), or else from their date of birth, as English schools count it. Each year shows its lessons and hours.
Time period — give the plan a name, set the Start and Finish by dates and the Hours a week you can give the subject. Use the quick periods (One academic year, Two academic years, The board's usual length) or type your own dates. For an Oak key stage the period starts at a year for each year you chose, rather than the whole key stage. Under Breaks, the breaks from your most recent plan for that learner (or your most recent plan with any) are already filled in where they fall in this period — Remove any that don't apply, add your own with From, To, Reason and Add break, or use Copy breaks from to add another plan's. The fit check counts them and updates as you type.
Build — check the summary. Lay the week out as a timetable too is ticked by default, and you land on the timetable once the plan is built. Choose where it starts:
A new timetable — set its Study days (filled in from your most recent timetable for that learner, or proposed from the plan's weekly need) and any Activities and blocked-out time: Add an activity, Block out time, or From your timetables to reuse the ones you already keep. Each has a name, its days and a time; days that aren't study days are left out. The plan's periods go round them, up to the hours it needs.
Build on one of your timetables (offered when you have one) — pick it, and the wizard says whether it has room: how much time it has free a week against what the plan needs. A copy keeps its study days, recurrence, subjects, activities and blocked-out time, and the plan's periods go into the free time; your timetable itself isn't changed. When it hasn't room, tick Refine the timetable with AI to have AI make room in the copy by shortening its other subjects — activities, blocked-out time and pinned periods stay where they are — or choose Start a new timetable instead. Without one or the other, Build my curriculum says there isn't room and doesn't go ahead.
Untick the timetable to land on the plan itself. On a new timetable, Refine the timetable with AI (about 3 credits, if your account has AI credits) adjusts period length and recurrence within what the plan needs. Then click Build my curriculum. A Building your curriculum dialog shows each step as it happens — building the plan, laying out the week (with the AI refinement, when chosen, which can take a minute or two), opening the result — with a clock; if a step fails it says which, and why.
Read the plan
At the top, four figures: the taught content in hours and statements, the number of weeks, the hours needed each week against what you set aside, and how much is done.
A plan's four figures: what it covers, the weeks, the time it needs, and how much is done
Under What to cover, two views — By week opens first:
By week shows the plan week by week, as a Grid or a List (the buttons at its top right; your choice is remembered on this device). Type in Find a topic to narrow either to the topics that match — a word from a topic's name, its reference, or the heading it sits under; every word you type has to appear, in any order. The grid keeps only the weeks that hold a match and opens on the first, so its arrows step from one match to the next; the list shows only those weeks. A line under the box says how many topics matched, and Escape or the × clears it.
Grid — a column for each week, labelled Week 4 and w/c 28 Sept (the Monday it commences), with how many of its statements are done. It opens on this week, marked This week. Use the arrows to move a week back or forward, This week to come back, or the week list to jump to any week. As many weeks show as fit your screen — one on a phone, up to six on a wide one. Each statement sits under its topic, with its status circle. A week a break takes out is named by the break and says no study.
List — every week in turn, each with its total time and how much is done, and breaks in their place. Go to this week scrolls to the current one.
By topic shows the specification as the board organises it. Themes are open; click a topic's arrow (or Expand all) to see its statements. Each statement shows its reference (e.g. 1.4B), the board's notes, the week it falls in and its time estimate. Type in the search box to find a statement — "surds", "1.4", "histogram" — and the tree narrows to the matches with their headings kept. Several words narrow it further: each has to appear somewhere in the statement, its reference or the board's notes, in any order.
Weeks are numbered among the study weeks — a break week isn't counted — and labelled by the Monday they commence, the same way in every view, in print and on a timetable built from the plan.
By week, as a grid: a column for each week, opening on this one
See every subject together, week by week
Each plan is one subject. Week by week puts a learner's plans side by side, the way a targets sheet is laid out: their subjects down the side and a column for each week commencing, each cell holding that subject's topics for the week, with a tick box beside each.
Open it from Week by week at the top of the Curriculum builder, from Curriculum on your learner's card on Home, or from the link at the top of a plan's By week.
Learner — when more than one learner has plans, choose whose weeks to see. Plans that aren't for a learner in particular are listed together too.
Subjects — every one of the learner's plans is shown; select a subject's name to leave it out, and again to bring it back.
The grid opens on this week, marked This week. Use the arrows to move a week at a time, This week to come back, or the week list to jump. As many weeks show as fit your screen.
Select a topic's circle where it stands to mark it started, then completed — the same status as on the plan itself. Select a subject's name at the start of its row to open its plan.
Print or save as PDF prints the weeks five to a page, landscape, as a sheet with the week commencing dates across the top.
Weeks are numbered among the weeks anyone is studying. Subjects can have different breaks: a week only one subject has off shows … — no study in that subject's row; a week every subject has off is named by the break.
Find teaching resources
Under each topic in the By topic view, small links point to free teaching resources that cover it — the matching units on Oak National Academy, the free UK curriculum library, where the catalogue has a match — and a Search Oak National Academy link that searches the library for the topic's name where it doesn't. They open in a new tab. Resources are curated per specification and can be updated without changing your plan.
Print the plan
Click Print or save as PDF. The screen's controls drop away and you get the plan as a week-by-week checklist: each week's date, its statements with their references and time estimates, and a tick box showing what you've already marked done. In the print dialog, choose "Save as PDF" as the destination to keep a copy.
Mark topics started and completed
Every statement has a status circle, in every view — the grid, the list, By topic and Week by week:
Circle
Status
Means
Empty
Pending
Not started yet — where every topic begins
Half filled
In progress
Started, not finished
Filled, ticked
Completed
Covered
Select the circle to move it on: Pending → In progress → Completed. Selecting a completed one asks Mark it pending again? first, because its dates are cleared — choose Keep it completed if it was a slip. Going straight from Pending to Completed takes two selections; the day it was started is then the same as the day it was completed.
Hover over a circle (or move to it with the keyboard) to see Status, Started and Completed, with the dates as dd/mm/yy. The Done figure and the plan's progress bar count completed statements and update straight away.
Each change is written to the learner's log on Progress, as Started: …, Completed: … or Reopened: … with the subject and the plan's name — one line a day per topic for each person who changes it, so starting and finishing something the same day is one line saying Completed, and setting it back to Pending the same day removes the line. A plan that isn't for a learner in particular has no log to write to, and nor does an archived plan. Lines from a plan you made yourself are for your family. Tutors you're connected to don't see them, just as they don't see the plan, but a tutor you've shared the plan with sees the lines they wrote. A tutor's plan for your child writes lines you both see. Logging progress or adding evidence that ticks a topic off already makes its own entry, so it doesn't add a second. Your learner can change their own topics the same way from their page, and their changes are logged in their name.
Change who the plan is for
Learner, at the top of Period and pace, says who the plan is for. Choose another of your learners — or Unassigned — no learner in particular — and it's saved at once: the plan's weeks move to that learner's Week by week and their card on Home, and the progress shown is that learner's own — what they've started and completed, with the dates, or every topic Pending if the plan is new to them. The first learner's progress is kept: move the plan back and it returns as it was. Topics marked skipped stay skipped, as that's the plan's choice rather than the learner's. A plan named after its learner ("Maths — Rowan") is renamed with them. A timetable already built from the plan keeps its own learner — change it on the timetable if it should move too. Tasks already set from the plan's topics stay with the first learner, and finishing them no longer ticks the plan. Providers can choose any learner of a family that has accepted their connection, as when building a plan. When a family ends the connection, a provider's plans for their children stay with the provider but are Unassigned — back at Pending, with nothing of the child's progress kept. A plan with no learner says Unassigned on its page and on Curriculum builder. Under Learner, Who it's been for lists each change with its date: who it was made for, moved to or unassigned from, and when a connection ended. A learner you can no longer see is never named there.
Share a plan with a tutor
A family can share any plan for its own children with tutors it's connected to, on every plan, Free included. A tutor's plan for a family they teach can't be shared onward, and a plan moved to a learner outside your family stops being shared. Open the plan and click Share. Share with a tutor lists every provider you're connected to; switch on each one who should have the plan, and switch them off to stop sharing. Each tutor is shared with separately, and a tutor you share with is sent a notification.
A tutor you share a plan with sees it under Shared with you on their Curriculum builder and can open it week by week. They can mark its topics Pending, In progress or Completed as they teach them. Each change goes in your learner's log under the tutor's name, and only your family and that tutor see the line, not your other tutors. They can't change the dates, pace, breaks or who the plan is for. They can't skip a topic or change one you skipped, and they don't see your notes or the plan's history. The plan stays yours and stays with your child. Your learner's own page shows it as before.
Archiving the plan takes it away from every tutor it's shared with. So does ending a connection with that tutor: they lose the plan at once, and the lines they wrote stay in your learner's log. Connecting again doesn't bring the plan back; share it again if you want them to have it.
Change the period or pace
Under Period and pace, change the Start, Finish by, Hours a week or Tier — or, on an Oak key stage, the Years the plan covers. The plan re-paces itself the moment you leave the field, keeping everything you've already ticked off. Leaving out a year takes its lessons out of the plan; if you have ticked any of them off, AltEd asks first, because those ticks go with them. The fit line underneath tells you where you stand:
Fit line
Meaning
Fits comfortably
The content needs clearly less than the time you set aside.
Fits, but it's tight
You need most of the time you set aside — a missed week will need catching up.
Doesn't fit at this pace
The content needs more each week than you set aside. The plan still covers everything by the end date, but at a heavier pace. Move the end date, or give it more hours a week.
Nothing is ever dropped to make a plan fit: the content is what the board examines.
Build a timetable from the plan
Click Build a timetable at the top of the plan. A dialog lists your plans with this one already ticked and, beside each, the hours it needs each week to finish on time. Tick any others you want in the same week, give the timetable a name (one is suggested), and click Build timetable.
AltEd creates the timetable, turns each plan into a subject weighted by its weekly need, proposes a Monday-to-Friday study window just long enough for the total and a period length that suits the plans' statements, lays the week out, and opens it in the builder. Each subject there is labelled with the plan it came from. The timetable also takes the plan's dates and breaks, so on the Family and Provider plans it runs week by week through the plan's period, each week showing the topics the plan paced into it — see The timetable through the year in Timetables. Change the days, add your fixed activities, and press Lay out the week again.
Where a model is configured and your plan includes AI assistance, a Refine with AI switch appears in the dialog. It may adjust the period length, the recurrence mode and the weightings — but only within a quarter of what the plans need, so it can never put a plan behind. Each adjustment comes with a one-line reason.
Below the figures, a plan shows Used by with links to the timetables built from it.
Rebuild on a newer issue
When the board publishes a new issue of a specification, plans built on the old one show a notice at the top. Click Rebuild on the latest issue. AltEd creates a new plan on the newest issue with the same learner, dates, hours, tier, years and breaks, and carries your ticks across wherever the new issue has a statement with the same reference. The old plan is kept exactly as it was, for reading — a plan is rebuilt once. If the newest issue no longer has one of the plan's years, it says so rather than widening the plan; build a new plan from it instead.
Delete a plan
Open the ⋯ menu at the top right and choose Delete plan. You'll be asked to confirm. The specification itself is unaffected.
What each screen shows
The Curriculum builder list shows a card per plan: its name, the board, level, code and issue it was built from, the learner, the period and weekly hours, and a progress bar. A plan built from an issue the board has since replaced shows Newer spec available. A tutor also sees Shared with you, with a card for each plan a family has shared with them, showing who shared it and who it's for.
The builder is five steps with a progress tracker along the top. You can click back to any step you've completed. Nothing is saved until the last step.
Week by week has the Your plans | Week by week switch, the learner and subjects chooser, Find a topic in any subject, and the grid — a row per subject, a column per week — with Print or save as PDF. A search narrows the grid to the subjects and weeks that hold a match; what prints is always the whole plan.
The plan has the four figures, the Period and pace panel, the two content views, and a footer naming the board, code and issue the plan was built from. The main button at the top is Build a timetable until the plan has one; after that it becomes Timetable (or Timetables (n)), a menu listing every timetable built from this plan and, last, Build a new timetable….
Block out holidays and illness
Under Breaks on a plan, give a From and To date and a Reason (half term, a holiday, unwell) and click Add break. A week is taken out when the break covers at least four of its seven days, counted Monday to Sunday — a long weekend leaves the week in, and a Monday-to-Friday half term takes it out whatever day the plan started — and the plan re-paces itself around the weeks that are left, keeping everything you've ticked off. Nothing is dropped: the content moves into the study weeks that remain, and the fit line at the top says whether the period still works — Fits comfortably, Fits, but it's tight, or Doesn't fit at this pace with the date you'd finish instead, so you can move the end date, shorten the break or add hours. The Weeks tile becomes Study weeks with the number off, and By week shows each break week in its place, marked with the reason. Remove a break to put the week back.
Copy breaks from, above the list, adds another of your plans' breaks — the ones that fall in this plan's period and aren't already there — and re-paces once. Each plan in the menu says how many of its breaks fall in this period; one with none there can't be chosen. A new plan starts with the breaks of your most recent plan for the same learner, so half terms and holidays only need entering once.
Import my own curriculum
Many families already plan their year themselves — a weekly targets sheet with a row per subject, a list of topics with "1 lesson a week from week 11 – 20", a spreadsheet, a rough plan in a diary. Import my own curriculum reads that document — or a photo of it — with AI and builds a plan for each subject you choose, in the weeks your document gives, with one timetable for all of them.
On the Curriculum builder, click Import → Import my own curriculum (or choose it on New plan).
Your document — drag your file onto the box, or click it to choose one. Word (.docx, .doc), Excel (.xlsx, .xls), PDF, rich text (.rtf) or plain text (.txt), up to 4 MB. Click Read my document. AltEd reads its text — tables row by row — and AI finds the subjects in it, its weeks and how each is paced. This takes under a minute, even for a long weekly targets sheet with a year of weeks and many subjects, and about 6 AI credits.
A photo or a scan works too. Drop, paste or choose up to four photos — a page each — or use Take a photo of your plan on a phone. A document or a screenshot can be pasted onto the page too, then Read my photos. Handwriting is fine; take each page flat, in good light. A scanned PDF (pictures of pages, no text) is read the same way, its first four pages. AI writes the pictures out first — about 6 more credits — and then reads that text like a document. Photos are shrunk on your device before they're sent, and neither they nor the scan are kept. If nothing in them can be read, it says so: take a closer, sharper photo and try again.
Subjects — every subject found, with how many topics each has and how it's paced. Untick any you don't want and rename any you like. Worth checking lists anything AI wasn't sure of — including words in a photo that were hard to make out.
Learner & dates — choose the learner and the level. Start and Finish by are filled in from your document's own dates — reaching the last week it plans for, even past the weeks it dates — or this week to the end of June when it has none. Weeks your document skips (a gap between two dated weeks) are filled in as Breaks; change any of them. About how long does one topic take? is used where your document doesn't say. Keep each topic in the week your document puts it (ticked when your document has weeks) keeps its weeks — week 1 is the first study week; untick it to spread the topics evenly instead.
Timetable — Lay the week out as one timetable for all of them is ticked: one week with every subject on it, each given the time it needs. Set its name, study days and activities as in the builder, or build on one of your timetables.
Build — check the summary and click Build my curriculum. AI reads each subject in full, one at a time — about 9 credits and a minute or so each — and the page shows each subject as it is built. Keep the page open while it builds. When every subject is done, the timetable is laid out and you land on the learner's Week by week, with the timetable a click away in the message.
If you leave part-way, the import waits: the Curriculum builder shows Importing … with Carry on, and opening it picks up where it stopped (offered for a fortnight). A subject that fails is tried again by itself; after three tries the page says which and Try … again carries on from there. Cancel the import stops it — subjects already built are kept. A subject your document turns out to have no topics for is skipped and said so.
What's built is yours alone. Each subject is a plan like any other — statuses, breaks, Week by week, print — and its page says Your own curriculum. Under Period and pace, Keep the weeks from your document switches between your document's weeks and spreading the topics evenly. Change a topic's wording or time (at the foot of the plan) opens the topics read from your document, where you can correct one, delete one no plan uses, or reorder them.
Your file itself is never kept. Its text is kept only while the import is open and deleted once the plans are built or the import is cancelled.
Add topics to your own plan
Some subjects are planned term by term, or as the books arrive. When the next part is ready, add it to the plan you already have rather than importing again:
Open the subject's plan and click Add topics (beside Print or save as PDF).
Type or paste the topics, one a line. Bullets and numbers at the start of a line are dropped.
Minutes for each starts at a typical topic's time in this plan; change it if the new ones are longer or shorter.
If the plan keeps the weeks from your document, choose The first one in. It starts at the week after the plan's last topic, and each topic after the first goes in the following week. If the plan spreads topics evenly, there's no week to choose: they're paced on from where the plan ends.
Click Add topics. They go after the plan's last topic, the plan is re-paced, and everything you've ticked off stays ticked. Adding topics is free; nothing is sent to AI.
New topics can be corrected, reordered or deleted like the others with Change a topic's wording or time. A section holds up to 200 topics and a subject up to 400, as an import does. If the new topics run past the plan's last week, the dialog says so; move Finish by later to give them weeks of their own.
From an updated document. If you keep your plan in a document and have added the next weeks to it, the dialog's From a document tab reads that instead of you typing it:
Click Add topics, then From a document.
Choose the updated file (Word, Excel, PDF, rich text or plain text, up to 4 MB) and click Read it. AI reads this plan's subject in it — about 9 AI credits, as a subject of an import is — and lists only the topics the plan doesn't have yet, each with the week your document gives it. Topics already in the plan are matched by their words (capitals and punctuation don't count) and left as they are, ticks and all; the dialog says how many.
Untick any you don't want, then click Add N topics. That part is free.
If nothing in the document is new, it says so and adds nothing. Anything AI wasn't sure of is listed under Worth checking. The tab is there only when AI is available on AltEd.
Add topics is only on plans built from your own curriculum. A plan from the catalogue follows the board's specification, which is shared, so its topics can't be added to.
Add a specification the catalogue doesn't have
If your level, subject or board isn't offered, you can import the specification yourself from the board's own document — no need to ask AltEd. On the Curriculum builder page click Import → Import a specification, or choose it at the top of New plan. Start from the board's page for the qualification: paste its address and click Find the details. AltEd reads the page and fills in what it holds — the board, level, subject, qualification code, issue and the specification PDF (AQA and Pearson Edexcel pages are read best; Pearson's pages don't show the qualification code, so check the document for it). Every field stays yours to correct; you can also type them all by hand — the board's PDF, its handle and name, the level, subject, code and issue. Then click Start the import. It reads the document in steps — the outline, then each theme, part by part — with a card showing progress. Each step uses your AI credits: a short specification about 30, a long one such as an A-level science 150 or more, and once the outline is read the card says about how many more it needs.
The import runs in the background, so you can close the dialog or leave AltEd and come back: the Curriculum builder page shows it with Open the import while it is open, and a notification tells you when the draft is ready or the import needs you. Pause stops it after the step in progress and Resume carries on. If your credits run out it shows Waiting for credits — nothing read so far is lost, and it carries on by itself after a top-up or when your monthly credits return on the 1st. A step that fails is tried again by itself; after three attempts the card says Needs attention and Try again re-runs only that step. While an import is open the form beneath it is locked, so the same document can't be started twice.
If you would rather not do this yourself, the dialog links to Contact us and we will add the specification for you.
When it says Draft stored, the specification is in your picker marked Imported by you · not yet checked by AltEd, and you can build a plan on it straight away. It stays yours alone until an administrator has checked it against the document and published it, at which point everyone can use it. Check the themes, topics and statements against the document yourself too — it was read by a model, and the estimates are its starting point.
Check and correct your draft
Check the draft (in the import's card, and in the notification when it lands) opens your draft as a plan will read it, with the same page administrators use: totals, Things to check against the document, and the whole tree. While the draft is yours — a draft you imported, not yet locked or published — you can put right what the import got wrong:
Edit (the pencil on a row) changes a unit's reference, wording, notes and, for a statement, its teaching time. What the import read is kept: the row is marked Edited, the dialog shows the original beside your change, and Revert to this — or the undo arrow on the row — puts it back. An edit that lands back on the original words is simply no longer an edit.
Delete (the bin) takes a unit out of the content. It stays on the page struck through and marked Deleted, and Restore puts it back; plans never see a deleted unit, and the totals leave it out.
Reorder by dragging the handle at the left of a row among the units under the same heading — a topic among its theme's topics, a statement among its topic's statements. A unit can't be moved under a different heading.
An administrator can lock a specification, after which only they can change it; a locked draft says so at the top. Publishing or withdrawing a specification locks it. Two more rules keep plans safe: a unit that any plan already covers can't be deleted (edit its wording instead), and if somebody else has built a plan on your draft, only an administrator can change it. Deleting a heading deletes everything under it, and restoring the heading brings those back.
Import from Oak National Academy
For primary and Key Stage 3 subjects, Import from Oak (under Import on the Curriculum builder page, and at the top of New plan) reads Oak National Academy's programme pages instead of a board's document — no model, no credits.
Open the subject under Oak's curriculum, choose the phase, and copy the address of its units page — for example https://www.thenational.academy/teachers/programmes/maths-primary/units. Paste it into Programme page on Oak and click Find the years.
AltEd lists the year groups it found, grouped by key stage, with each year's unit and lesson counts. Tick a key stage to take every year in it, or the years you want.
Click Import. Every unit of the year is read, whichever of Oak's strands it belongs to (the programme page itself shows only the first strand until you filter). Each year is read in turn — a line per year shows its progress — and lands in one draft per key stage: a theme per year, a topic per unit in Oak's sequence with a link to the unit on Oak and its National curriculum statements, and a statement per lesson with its outcome as the notes, a link to the lesson, and the time Oak gives that subject's lessons as the estimate.
Check the draft opens it. Importing a year again replaces that year in your draft and keeps its other years, so the years can be taken one at a time; a draft somebody has built a plan on is left alone. Key Stage 4 years are not offered — those are the exam boards' specifications.
The draft is your own. If another family imports the same subject and key stage, they get a draft of their own, and neither gets in the other's way. A subject and key stage already published in the catalogue can't be imported again; choose it in the builder instead. If AltEd publishes somebody else's draft of the same subject first, yours stays yours to build on. A subject AltEd has withdrawn from the catalogue can't be imported as your own draft, and Oak's programmes can only come in through Import from Oak, not from a document.
Plans and limits
Plan
Curriculum plans from the catalogue
Subjects of your own
AI credits a month
Free
1
5
—
Family
Unlimited
Unlimited
100
Provider
Unlimited
Unlimited
300
Plans from the catalogue are unlimited on every plan, Free included. Subjects imported from your own document are counted separately, because AI reads them: up to two on Free (an account that kept more before 15 October 2026 keeps them, but can't add more), unlimited on Family and Provider — when a document has more than you have room for, choose which to build. One import builds up to twenty subjects on any plan. Reading your own document uses AI credits (about 9 to find its subjects and about 9 for each subject built), which on Free can mean a top-up. Building a plan from the catalogue uses no credits at all. AI assistance — advice on timetable weightings (about 3 credits), and for administrators importing a specification the catalogue doesn't have yet (many credits, charged per step) — spends AI credits, which come with every plan — 10 a month on Free, more on Family and Provider — and can be topped up on any plan; it is only offered on instances where a model has been configured. The wizard and the Refine with AI switch show your balance before you spend anything.
Tips and good to know
Time estimates are a starting point. They were set by hand from the weight the specification gives each statement, and they include practice time. A confident learner will move faster.
Start with the tier you'll sit. Switching tier later keeps your ticks, but the weeks are re-laid, so do it early if you can.
A plan pins its specification issue. If the board publishes a new issue, your plan doesn't change underneath you. Build a new plan when you're ready to move.
Build the timetable from the plan, not beside it. The weightings then come from what the plan needs each week rather than a guess, and the builder shows the plan behind each subject.
Troubleshooting
Problem
What to try
A level is greyed out with "No specifications yet"
The catalogue doesn't hold a specification at that level yet. More are being added; the first is Edexcel IGCSE Mathematics A.
"That learner could not be found."
The learner isn't one you can see. Guardians see their own children; providers see the learners of families who have accepted a connection.
"The end date must be after the start date"
Move Finish by past Start.
The fit line says "Doesn't fit at this pace"
The plan still covers everything, at a heavier weekly load. Extend Finish by, raise Hours a week, or (for tiered subjects) choose the smaller tier.
I ticked something off and it came back
The change didn't reach the server — check your connection and tick it again. Your other ticks are safe.
A plan has Year 1 and Year 2 in it, but I teach Year 2
Plans built before October 2026 covered every year of an Oak key stage. Untick Year 1 under Period and pace → Years; the plan re-paces over Year 2 alone. Shorten Finish by if it now finishes well early.
"Newer spec available" on a plan
The board has published a new issue since this plan was built. Your plan is unchanged; a new plan will use the latest issue.
An import says Waiting for credits
Your credits ran out before its next step. Nothing is lost: top up on AI credits, or wait for your monthly credits on the 1st, and it carries on by itself.
"Your import of … is still open"
One import runs at a time. Open the import from the Curriculum builder page, then let it finish or Cancel it.
"… is already in the catalogue"
That issue is already published — choose it in the builder rather than importing it again.
An import says Needs attention
One step failed three times. Nothing read so far is lost; Try again re-runs only that step.
"AltEd can't read that kind of file."
Import my own curriculum reads Word, Excel, PDF, rich text and plain text, judged by what's inside the file rather than its name. Save it again as one of those.
"AltEd couldn't read the writing in that."
The photo or scan was too blurred, dark or far away. Take each page flat and close, in good light, and try again — or type the plan into a document.
"The Free plan keeps 2 subjects of your own…"
Delete an imported subject you no longer need, or upgrade to Family. When you have room for fewer than the document holds, choose which to build.
From a document finds nothing new, but there is
It reads this plan's subject by the name you gave it when you imported it. If your document calls it something quite different, type the topics instead.
There's no Add topics on a plan
It's only on plans built from your own curriculum (Import my own curriculum). A catalogue plan's topics are the board's.
The added topics are all in the last week
They run past the plan's period. Move Finish by later under Period and pace.
An imported subject's topics are all in the last week
Your document plans further than the period you set. Move Finish by later under Period and pace, or untick Keep the weeks from your document.
For administrators
An administrator's Curriculum builder opens the Specification catalogue (/dashboard/curriculum-builder/catalogue). Its header has New plan (the same five-step wizard families use) and Import, whose menu holds Import from Oak (Oak National Academy's programmes for primary and Key Stage 3 — see Import from Oak National Academy above; an administrator's draft is locked from the start; families' own Oak drafts of the same subject each wait under Awaiting review with who imported them, and once one is published the others can't be published over it; nor can an older issue be published while a newer one is), Import a specification (brings the import form at the bottom of the page into view) and Import my own curriculum; beside it is Sync catalogue files. Plans you've built yourself are listed under Your plans.
Awaiting review comes first: every draft imported from a board's document, with who imported it and when, its size, Review, The document and Publish. A notice with the same facts is emailed to the AltEd admin address the moment a draft lands, and the Overview's Specifications to review tile counts them. A draft is visible only to its importer until you publish it.
Every issue is a grid: search by title, code or subject; filter by board, level or status; sort any column; 25 a page. Select a specification's name to review it. A padlock beside the status marks a locked issue. Each row's ⋯ menu has Review the content, opens the board's document and qualification page, Lock the content or Unlock the content, and offers Publish, Withdraw or Return to draft as its status allows.
Sync catalogue files re-reads the curated specification files shipped with AltEd. Each of these actions first opens a short explanation — what it does, what it touches, who will notice, what it costs — and runs only when you confirm. Publishing an issue marks older published issues of the same qualification as superseded, and families on those see the "Newer spec available" notice; withdrawing takes an issue away from every family's picker (plans already built keep working).
Review a specification
Review opens the specification as families will build from it (/dashboard/curriculum-builder/catalogue/<id>):
The header names the board, level, subject, code and issue, with The document, The qualification page (The programme page for an Oak import), Lock or Unlock, and the status action — Publish, Withdraw or Return to draft, each explained before it runs.
Where it came from — imported from the board's document when and by whom, read from Oak National Academy's programme pages, or from the curated catalogue files — whether it is Locked (and since when, by whom), and the first teaching and assessment years.
Totals: themes, topics, taught statements, taught time, tiers, and how many plans are already built on it.
Things to check against the document lists the slips a stepwise read can make — a reference used more than once, a theme with nothing under it, statements with no time estimate — with a few examples of each to search for. When there are none it says so, and reminds you the wording and numbering still need checking.
Content is the whole tree in the document's order: each theme and topic with its kind and statement count, each statement with its reference, tier tag, the board's notes, linked resources and estimate (No estimate where there isn't one). Search by reference or wording; Expand all and Collapse all open or close every heading.
Open the board's document beside it and read the statements against it before you Publish.
Correct the content
The review is where a specification is put right, and administrators can change any issue, published or not. Every row has:
Edit (pencil) — the reference, wording, notes and, on a statement, the teaching time. The first edit keeps what the import read on the row: it shows as Edited with a coloured left edge, the dialog shows the original beside the change with Revert to this, and the undo arrow on the row reverts it too. An edit back to the original words clears the mark.
Delete (bin) — the unit stays on the page struck through and marked Deleted, out of every plan's read and out of the totals, until Restore puts it back. A theme whose statements are all deleted is reported as a heading with nothing under it.
The handle at the left — drag a unit among the units under its own heading (a topic among its theme's topics, a statement among its topic's statements). Dropping it under another heading does nothing and says so. Dragging is off while a search is showing part of the tree.
The Content line counts the edits and deletions so far. Every change is written to the audit trail against the specification.
Lock a specification
Lock (in the header, or Lock the content in a catalogue row's menu) keeps a specification to administrators: its importer can still see and build on their draft but not change it. Unlock gives a draft back to its importer. A locked issue shows a padlock in the catalogue and a Locked badge on the review page. Everything imported by an administrator — from a board's document, from Oak, or from the catalogue files — is locked from the start; a family's own draft is theirs to correct until it is locked or published.
A statement whose reference only repeated its topic's — a stepwise read's habit when a document numbers the topic and lists its content beneath — is now stored without one, so the reference used more than once check reports real duplicates only.
Import a specification from a board document
At the bottom of the page, Import a specification from a board document reads a board's PDF with AI and stores the result as a draft for you to check. It is disabled, with an explanation, on instances where no model is configured. Administrators are not metered: no credits are charged or mentioned, though every call is recorded and priced on AI usage. Families can run the same import themselves from the Curriculum builder page (see above); their drafts land in Awaiting review.
Fill in the Specification document (PDF URL) — the board's own PDF — and, optionally, the board's page for the qualification. Give the board's upper-case handle and name (for example EDEXCEL, Pearson Edexcel), the level, subject, qualification code (9MA0) and issue (Issue 4).
Click Start the import. The import appears above the form as a card and starts itself.
It runs in steps: Reading the outline (every theme and topic), then one step per theme — or, for a big theme, per part of a few topics (Theme 1 of 2, part 2 of 3) — reading every statement under those topics with the board's notes and a time estimate, then Assembling the draft. The bar and the step line show where it is; a step can take a few minutes on a reasoning model. Each is recorded and priced on AI usage, and the card keeps a running total in credits and, once the outline is read, about how many more it needs.
Every step is saved as it lands. Imports run in the background: leave the page and a background runner carries on, usually within a minute or two, and the card is there when you come back. While the page is open it runs the steps back to back. Pause stops after the step in progress — for the background runner too — and Resume carries on.
If an attempt fails — the provider refused, or a connection dropped — the card says why and tries that step again by itself, after a minute and then after two. After three failed attempts it stops as Needs attention, and Try again re-runs only that step. Nothing already read is lost, and nothing already charged is charged again.
When it says Draft stored, the specification is in Awaiting review and the table above as a draft. Select Review, open the board's document beside it and check the themes, topics and statements before you Publish.
Every unfinished import on the platform is listed here, whoever started it, with their name — including families' imports that are Paused, Waiting for credits or Needs attention. Finish on AltEd's account explains what it will cost and, once confirmed, carries the import on with every remaining step charged to your administrator account instead of theirs; they get a notification saying so.
Cancel abandons an import after a confirmation; what it has read stays on the card, no draft is made, and credits already spent are not refunded. While your own import is open, the form beneath it is locked.
Turn uncovered topics into tasks
A plan that names a learner can feed the tracker. On Progress → Tasks, select From the curriculum: every topic the plan has not yet covered is listed by week; tick some, optionally give them a due date, and each becomes a revision task pointing back at its topic. Completing the task — by the learner, or on their behalf — ticks the topic off the plan, so the plan's progress bar and the tracker agree. See Progress — the tracker.