We’ve tried to answer commonly -asked questions below. If you can’t find the answer you need, please Contact Us and a member of our team will be in touch. If you have a question about a particular lesson, please tell us which subject, year and lesson you are querying.

To find out more about the inspiration for Kapow Primary, see our About page.

Q&A: Mixed-age planning for music

Q. We are a small school with a pure Reception class then mixed age 1/2, 3/4 and 5/6 classes. As your units are single year group focussed, is there a way to plan a 2 year rolling programme mixing and matching units from each year group to ensure coverage?

 

A. The progression in our music scheme is mostly from EYFS (Rec) to Key stage 1 (Y1/2), to Lower key stage 2 (Y3/4), to Upper key stage 2 (Y5/6), so as long as you move units but keep them within those phases you should be fine. It would be better for you to make the decisions about which topics to teach when, sby selecting units that fit best with your existing topics in school as the music units do this well. The suggested differentiation activities should help you to meet the needs of the wider range of abilities in a mixed-age class too.

 

See our Music mixed-age planning.

Q&A: Mixed-age planning for music

Q. We are a small school with a pure Reception class then mixed age 1/2, 3/4 and 5/6 classes. As your units are single year group focussed, is there a way to plan a 2 year rolling programme mixing and matching units from each year group to ensure coverage?

 

A. The progression in our music scheme is mostly from EYFS (Rec) to Key stage 1 (Y1/2), to Lower key stage 2 (Y3/4), to Upper key stage 2 (Y5/6), so as long as you move units but keep them within those phases you should be fine. It would be better for you to make the decisions about which topics to teach when, sby selecting units that fit best with your existing topics in school as the music units do this well. The suggested differentiation activities should help you to meet the needs of the wider range of abilities in a mixed-age class too.

 

See our Music mixed-age planning.

FAQ: Can we drop units from your music scheme and still meet national curriculum requirements?

Q. Can we drop units from your music scheme and still meet national curriculum requirements?  Even your condensed curriculum for music takes up too much of our time.

A. Deciding not to teach a unit from the condensed curriculum does pose the risk of certain skills or knowledge being missed or not consolidated. You should base the choice of unit to omit on the learning needs of your particular children. The best way to identify a unit to leave out for each year group is to refer to Kapow Primary, Music key skills and knowledge by unit.

This document outlines what skills and knowledge are covered in each unit, including indicating the condensed curriculum, so you can reflect on what skills the children are already more confident in and, therefore, could afford to miss. 

The document also enables teachers to plan opportunities for these skills to be covered where necessary. 

 

If your year 3 misses a year of the Kapow Primary scheme, you can reflect on which skills and knowledge their instrumental teaching has focussed on and then identify year 4 units that fill any gaps.  For example, if they have had lots of opportunities to perform then the units involving performance will not be a priority.

Omitting a unit – recommendations

The reason the condensed plan includes four units is so that all skills are taught and consolidated in more than one unit.  If you absolutely need to omit a unit, then the condensed plan represents all the National curriculum statements for music even if you omit the following units:

EYFS: Drop any unit except ‘Exploring sound’ to meet all key skills

Y1: Drop ‘Pitch and tempo – Superheroes’

Y2: Drop ‘Myths and legends’

Y3: Drop ‘Ballads’

Y4: Drop ‘Rivers’

Y5: Drop ‘Holi – festival of colour’

Y6: Drop ‘Advanced rhythms’

If you omit a unit then certain skills may only be covered once so consult the Kapow Primary, Music key skills and knowledge by unit. so you are clear.

 

 

FAQ: Design and technology. What is your rationale for your choice of units for each year group?

Q: Regarding Year 2 D &T, on the overview there are two mechanisms units but no textile unit.  Yet, in the Year 2 lessons, there is a textiles lesson. Please can you advise if textiles should be taught in year 2 and why there are two mechanisms units?

 

A: Some key areas do appear less frequently than others, for example, textiles.  This is deliberate. The national curriculum statements show that working with textiles is only a small element of the ‘Make’ strand and many of the making techniques covered in our textiles units are also covered with a range of materials in other units, such as the use of templates, modelling, measuring and marking out, cutting, shaping and joining.

Q&A: Mixed-age planning for music

Q. We are a small school with a pure Reception class then mixed age 1/2, 3/4 and 5/6 classes. As your units are single year group focussed, is there a way to plan a 2 year rolling programme mixing and matching units from each year group to ensure coverage?

 

A. The progression in our music scheme is mostly from EYFS (Rec) to Key stage 1 (Y1/2), to Lower key stage 2 (Y3/4), to Upper key stage 2 (Y5/6), so as long as you move units but keep them within those phases you should be fine. It would be better for you to make the decisions about which topics to teach when, sby selecting units that fit best with your existing topics in school as the music units do this well. The suggested differentiation activities should help you to meet the needs of the wider range of abilities in a mixed-age class too.

 

See our Music mixed-age planning.

Do you have lessons about gender identity?

Do you cover gender identity in your RSE lessons?

 

No, we don’t specifically cover gender identity as a topic, although we do look at identity more generally. Gender identity does not form part of the National Curriculum, and we would advise teachers to refer to their own school’s policy when considering how and whether to address this in class, or when thinking about how to adapt lessons should one of their pupils be questioning their own gender identity.

What does your membership of Kapow Primary include?

As a member, you will have full access to the schemes of work in the subjects you choose. You will have access to hundreds of lesson plans, demo videos and other teaching and classroom resources for a full twelve months. Schools can purchase a subscription for any number or combination of subjects.

Lesson plans

Each lesson plan is written by a subject specialist in collaboration with our in-house team of former teachers and content creators. and contains all the support and guidance you would expect to help you deliver an outstanding lesson. Lesson plans include clear assessment guidelines and ideas for differentiation.

Our lesson plans are carefully thought through to ensure your pupils make progress in each subject. We publish a long-term plan for each subject that sets out our suggested order for teaching units of lessons and guidance for schools that prefer to teach the units in a different order.

All of our lesson plans are editable, allowing you to tailor them to the specific needs of your children or your school’s curriculum.

Lesson plans focus on developing skills and concepts and are usually taught in the context of a popular topic. It’s generally possible to adapt the lesson plans to other topics and contexts.

Teacher videos

Members can stream hundreds of unique teacher videos specially-filmed to demonstrate key teaching and learning points for teachers to assist subject knowledge and provide CPD. They provide real-life demonstrations, examples, analogies and tips from subject-specialist teachers. As you watch each short video while planning for a lesson, you will develop subject knowledge, build your confidence and do CPD as you plan.

Classroom resources

Membership benefits include hundreds of whiteboard friendly presentations, printable worksheets, ready-made templates and step-by-step instructions for practical activities. This means you spend less time getting the basics ready and can focus the time you have saved addressing the specific needs of your children.

Take out a no-obligation free trial to find out more.

How much does it cost?

School members can choose from any combination or number of subjects. The more subjects you choose to buy, the less each subject costs. School membership covers an unlimited number of users in your school.

See school pricing here.

Schools can upgrade at any point in their subscription year and still benefit from the multi-subject discount.  Please note that if you upgrade your subscription part way through the subscription year, we pro-rate the price and length of the subscription for the extra subject(s) so that all your subscriptions come to an end on the same date.

How long does a subscription last?

Kapow Primary subscriptions last for a minimum of one year, but we’d be happy to discuss multi-year terms if required. Please Contact Us to discuss this further.

What does a trial include?

You will have full access to the website, but we limit the number of Lesson Plans and other classroom resources that you can download during the free trial. The trial lasts for one week.

We do not employ a sales team and we do not chase you for a decision at the end of the free trial.  There is no automatic sign up and there is nothing for you to do if you decide not to buy a subscription.

If you would like to extend access beyond that, or you have run out of download credits, please call us on 020 3873 1326, or Request a Callback.

I’m not from the UK, can I still use this?

Yes. Our resources are designed around the national curriculum for primary schools in England, but the practical nature of Kapow Primary’s subjects and our adaptable resources mean that teachers from all over the world find inspiration and time-saving content. Several international schools are members of Kapow Primary.

Can my colleagues have a free trial too?

Of course! In fact we very much encourage it. The more the merrier as far as we are concerned.

What’s a free account?

We decided to make our Wellbeing module free of charge to any member of Kapow Primary. If you do not want to buy one of our paid memberships, you can sign up for a free account, which provides full access to our Wellbeing module and we will also send you our regular newsletters so you can keep up to date with all the new content and developments at Kapow Primary.

Can I sign up for a free account if I decide not to buy a membership?

Of course! We want as many teachers, schools and pupils to benefit from our Wellbeing module and keep in touch with Kapow Primary.

How do I add sub-accounts or additional users?

The account administrator for your school account can create sub-accounts for each member of staff so they have their own logons for Kapow Primary.

If you cannot add someone contact us immediately providing the email address of the person you need to add.

Watch this short video to show what to do: Video, How to add extra users.

FAQ: Do you offer individual memberships?

We are unable to offer individual teacher memberships other than to our free wellbeing module.

I am trying to place an order, but nothing happens when I press submit

If you are trying to place an order and nothing happens: please check:

  1. Can you see any error messages – have you chosen a username that is unique?  Try a different username?
  2. Have you selected the subjects you wish to buy?  If you have chosen the two subject subscription for example, you will need to select two subjects (ignoring the wellbeing module)
  3. Have you confirmed that you accept our terms of use and privacy policy?

Still stuck?

 

Contact us

Can I swap the subjects my school has subscribed to?

You can add a subject at any time and still benefit from the multi-subject discount.

 

You may not drop or cancel a subject or swap one subject for another subject part way through a subscription year.

I can’t download resources and PDFs, what do I do?

Are you on a free trial?  We limit downloads during a free trial to ten items of content.

Otherwise, Ioff you cannot download a PDF or editable document, this is likely to be because some browsers’ security settings block downloads from sites that are not authorised.  It is usually a very quick fix and you will then be able to download resources from Kapow Primary.

The instructions below are specific to a Chrome browser, however the steps will be similar across all other browsers.  You will be able to search online for help to unblock our resources for your particular set up.

Chrome (Windows)

 

  1. Click the “Customize and control Google Chrome” menu (the three horizontal dots in the top right corner of the window).
  2. Select Settings.
  3. Select Show advanced settings (found at the bottom).
  4. Under Privacy, click the Content Settings button.
  5. To enable pop-ups on specific sites, check Do not allow any site to show pop-ups (recommended) and click Exceptions or add a site in the Allow list. In this case add www.kapowprimary.com.

If you need to contact us, please let us know which subject, year, topic and lesson you are looking at.  A screengrab always helps.

 

Please note that it is not possible to download presentations or videos.

Can you download the teacher and pupil videos?

The teacher and pupil videos are for streaming only and cannot be downloaded.  If you want to collect the videos in one place to share with your colleagues, we suggest you share the links to the lesson pages instead.

 

Can I download presentations?

The interactive whiteboard presentations are not downloadable or editable for technical and copyright reasons. If you have any feedback on the content of the presentations, please let us know.

How do I login and what happens if I lose my password?

Add [email protected] to your safe sender/contacts  then try using your email address with the forget password link: https://www.kapowprimary.com/lost-password/    and wait five minutes for the link to arrive and check your spam folder.

If you have a school subscription and you were not set up with your own login ID, you may need to contact the person at your school who set up the subscription.

If you get stuck, we will help you on the next working day if you Contact Us

I can’t download resources and PDFs, what do I do?

Are you on a free trial?  We limit downloads during a free trial to ten items of content.

Otherwise, Ioff you cannot download a PDF or editable document, this is likely to be because some browsers’ security settings block downloads from sites that are not authorised.  It is usually a very quick fix and you will then be able to download resources from Kapow Primary.

The instructions below are specific to a Chrome browser, however the steps will be similar across all other browsers.  You will be able to search online for help to unblock our resources for your particular set up.

Chrome (Windows)

 

  1. Click the “Customize and control Google Chrome” menu (the three horizontal dots in the top right corner of the window).
  2. Select Settings.
  3. Select Show advanced settings (found at the bottom).
  4. Under Privacy, click the Content Settings button.
  5. To enable pop-ups on specific sites, check Do not allow any site to show pop-ups (recommended) and click Exceptions or add a site in the Allow list. In this case add www.kapowprimary.com.

If you need to contact us, please let us know which subject, year, topic and lesson you are looking at.  A screengrab always helps.

 

Please note that it is not possible to download presentations or videos.

Can all the teachers at my school use Kapow Primary at the same time?

Absolutely, school membership of Kapow Primary comes with unlimited logins and downloads for every member of staff at your school.  Our aim is to help your school as a whole deliver a broad and balanced curriculum, by empowering you and all other teachers.

We therefore provide all teachers, TAs and other school staff with unlimited, 24/7 access to all of the resources for the subjects selected by the school.

 

Can I login at home?

Yes. Not a problem, you can access the site 24/7, we fully appreciate the importance of your planning time. You can use Kapow Primary anywhere you have access to the internet.

How do I print multiple pages of the resource on one page?

Please just follow the steps below to print multiple resources on one page:

 

  1. Click File > Print.
  2. In the Printer list, select the printer you want to use.
  3. Under Settings, in the Pages drop-down list, select Multiple pages per sheet and the number in Copies of each page.
  4. Click Print. Tips: Check the print preview to be sure that the pages will all fit on the sheet.
  5. If you’re still experiencing problems, please feel free to Contact Us.

Can I edit the resources?

If you have a full subscription to Kapow Primary you will be able to download many of our classroom resources (other than the videos and presentations) and then edit them to suit your needs.

I’ve just upgraded my subscription and cannot access the content for the new subjects

Your computer might have remembered your previous settings. Try logging out, refresh your page and clear your browser (CTRL +F5).

Alternatively, try logging in in an incognito or private window or on  a different device.

Contact Us if you are still having problems.

The videos are not playing

We have found that a small number of schools’ security systems block our videos. If this happens, you need to ask your IT department to mark Kapow Primary and www.wistia.com as safe sites.

Why won’t the links on my lesson plan work?

At the time of creating our resources, and periodically, we check all the links. Sometimes a third-party may remove certain content, so the links will no longer work. If you Contact Us to let us know which links aren’t working and what lesson you were looking at, we’ll get them updated for you.

How do I add sub-accounts or additional users?

The account administrator for your school account can create sub-accounts for each member of staff so they have their own logons for Kapow Primary.

If you cannot add someone contact us immediately providing the email address of the person you need to add.

Watch this short video to show what to do: Video, How to add extra users.

Do I get access to updates to your lessons during my subscription?

Yes!  We are constantly tweaking and improving our lessons, updating links, clarifying points and incorporating more CPD.  While you are a subscriber you can always access the latest version of a lesson online.  This is one reason why we recommend not printing lesson plans too far in advance – save links to the lessons instead.

 

Can I download and print off all the lessons in one go?

We do not think batch downloading and printing is a good idea!  We designed the website around a modern, online, continually evolving,  experience and we tweak and improve lessons and add resources and new links every day.  We discourage teachers from downloading lesson plans far in advance in case they miss out on updates.  We understand that many schools do expect teachers to upload plans to their systems, but suggest uploading links instead – many schools do this and embed links to Kapow Primary into their intranets.  In that way, teachers always have access to the most up-to-date versions and see the CPD videos.

If you are a subject lead and want to email lessons to your colleagues, again we suggest emailing them the links instead. In that way, your colleagues can see the entire lessons with all the videos and links to help them with their CPD and lesson planning.

If it is important to you to download all the lesson plans in advance, perhaps at the start of a half-term, the quickest way to do this is to go to a lesson plan page – click the download icon and then click the arrows at the bottom of the page to go to the next lesson plan and do the same thing.  This saves lots of clicks.

Can you download the teacher and pupil videos?

The teacher and pupil videos are for streaming only and cannot be downloaded.  If you want to collect the videos in one place to share with your colleagues, we suggest you share the links to the lesson pages instead.

 

Printable lesson plans on Kapow Primary

Can you print the Kapow Primary lesson plans?  Where do I find the Kapow Primary lesson plans?

You can find printable lesson plans in word and pdf versions on the left-hand side of all lesson pages.  Simply click to download.  NB to avoid missing out on improvements and CPD only print the lessons plans as close to the date of teaching the lesson as possible.  If you want to share the lesson with colleagues, share a link to the lesson instead to ensure they see the most recent version.

 

 

Can I download presentations?

The interactive whiteboard presentations are not downloadable or editable for technical and copyright reasons. If you have any feedback on the content of the presentations, please let us know.

Does your RSE/PSHE scheme cover all the SRE requirements?

Yes, our RSE & PSHE scheme covers all the requirements of the RSE/SRE statutory guidance, as well as aspects of PSHE which aren’t covered in the RSE framework, such as economic wellbeing and democracy.

You can read more about it here in this Teach Primary article:

https://www.kapowprimary.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Review-Kapow-1-2.pdf

And here’s our Curriculum overview: https://www.kapowprimary.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/RSE-Curriculum-Overview.pdf.

I am trying to place an order, but nothing happens when I press submit

If you are trying to place an order and nothing happens: please check:

  1. Can you see any error messages – have you chosen a username that is unique?  Try a different username?
  2. Have you selected the subjects you wish to buy?  If you have chosen the two subject subscription for example, you will need to select two subjects (ignoring the wellbeing module)
  3. Have you confirmed that you accept our terms of use and privacy policy?

Still stuck?

 

Contact us

How is Art and design assessed within the Kapow Primary units?

Kapow Primary aims to provide a range of assessment tools that can be used in any combination by schools, alongside their existing assessment processes. The assessment tracker spreadsheet, located here,
features two strands of attainment statements for each lesson; ‘secure understanding’ and ‘greater depth’. Children who don’t yet meet the ‘secure understanding’ statement are ‘working towards’. Our assessment grid provides some structure for gaining an overview of attainment. Each child’s attainment by lesson is calculated as a percentage so you can see at what level they are mostly working:

Art assessment screenshot

Of course, assessing Art and design isn’t as cut and dried as in some other subjects. Read our helpful blog by Susan Coles for advice.

Other professional bodies offer good advice for how to adapt assessment for use in your school. The NSEAD has a useful free guide here.

The knowledge organisers and quizzes are offered as a tool for self-reflection and formative assessment and alongside the progression of skills document and assessment sheets, should provide a range of assessment opportunities.

How do we pay?

You may pay with a credit card, or ask us to send you an invoice.  It doesn’t matter to us either way.  You get immediate access and do not need to wait for us to receive payment before enjoying the resources.

If you prefer to pay by invoice, we will send this to the finance contact at your school if you provide their details when you sign up.  Our payment terms are 30 days.

I’d like a receipt for my purchase

Not a problem, get in touch with our finance team via [email protected] and they’ll be happy to help.

Can schools reclaim the VAT?

UK schools should be able to reclaim the VAT on a Kapow Primary subscription and we will send you a VAT receipt to enable you to do so.

Can I offer some feedback about my experience?

Please Contact Us and let us know what you think of Kapow Primary and how we can improve.

We always welcome and encourage feedback as our product is ever-evolving.

I have an idea for a resource! How can I tell you about it?

That’s fantastic! We’d love you to Contact Us to share your ideas.

Does your RSE/PSHE scheme cover all the SRE requirements?

Yes, our RSE & PSHE scheme covers all the requirements of the RSE/SRE statutory guidance, as well as aspects of PSHE which aren’t covered in the RSE framework, such as economic wellbeing and democracy.

You can read more about it here in this Teach Primary article:

https://www.kapowprimary.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Review-Kapow-1-2.pdf

And here’s our Curriculum overview: https://www.kapowprimary.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/RSE-Curriculum-Overview.pdf.