Is it week 1 or week 2? How to find out

If your secondary school runs a two-week timetable, your lessons on a Tuesday in week 1 are not the same as on a Tuesday in week 2. Year 7 pupils get caught out most, but everyone asks on a Monday morning: is it week 1 or week 2? Here is where to find the answer, why the week number of the year is no help, and what changes after half term.

How a two-week timetable works

Over two weeks, the school has ten days of lessons to fill instead of five. That lets it give a subject, say, three lessons one week and two the next, or split a class into groups that swap each week. Schools call the two weeks week 1 and week 2, or week A and week B: it is the same idea.

The weeks simply alternate. What changes from one school to the next is which week starts the school year and how holidays are counted. Thornhill Community Academy, for example, starts every school year on week A.

Is it week 1 or week 2? Where to check

1. Your school planner. Many schools print which week each Monday is in the planner, next to term dates and INSET day dates.
2. The school calendar or website. Some schools publish a table of week 1 and week 2 for each term.
3. The school app. If your school puts timetables in an app, it shows the lessons of the week you are looking at, so one lesson that only happens fortnightly tells you which week it is.
4. Your form tutor or reception. If in doubt, especially on the first day back after a holiday, ask: they have the official calendar.

A week calculator on a random website does not know your school. It might be right, but it is a guess.

Week 1 of your timetable is not week 1 of the year

Search for “is it week 1 or week 2” and you mostly find week number sites. They answer a different question: the week number of the year, where week 1 is the first week of January. Your timetable’s week 1 has nothing to do with it, and an odd or even week number only matches your timetable if your school happened to line them up.

There is a trap at the end of 2026 as well: 2026 has 53 weeks. Week 53 runs from 28 December to 3 January, and Monday 4 January 2027 starts week 1. That puts two odd numbers in a row, so any rota based on odd and even week numbers slips by one week in January.

What happens after half term?

In practice you will meet one of two rules, and only your school knows which one it uses:

• the cycle keeps running through the holidays, as if lessons were happening;
• the cycle pauses over the holidays and picks up where it stopped.

Thornhill Community Academy explains the second rule on its timetable page: holidays are ignored for the purpose of the timetable, so a term that ends on week A is followed by a term that starts on week B. After a two-week break, both rules land on the same week. After a one-week half term they don’t, so the first Monday back is the day to check.

Get the right week on your phone

Rather than asking “is it week 1 or week 2?” every Monday, put both weeks of your timetable into TimeTo, which calls them week A and week B:

1. Open Settings and turn on A/B Week (for a timetable that repeats every week).
2. Next to This week is a week, pick A or B.
3. For each lesson, choose All, Week A or Week B.

From then on the app switches letter every week and shows it at the top of the week, next to the week number. It counts every calendar week, holidays included: if your school ignores holidays, the letter will be one week out after a one-week half term, so check it on the first day back and fix it with one tap in Settings. Do the same in the first week of January 2027. A/B weeks are part of the optional Premium subscription.

In short

Is it week 1 or week 2? Your school has the answer, in its calendar, your planner or the school app. The week number of the year is not a guide, especially after half term and in January 2027. To keep both weeks in view, our class schedule template has a week A and week B page, and TimeTo keeps both weeks and your homework on your phone. You can also compare it with other schedule apps for students.