Topic 29 — The Sun — blueprint (28 September 2026, night)
What I need from you: 3 decisions
May L01 say, in one line, that the Sun looks small because it is far away?
"the Sun is the size it looks" is a misconception the brief asks this topic to confront. The honest answer is the distance, but WHY far things look small (a headlight shrinking to a dot; every star but the Sun a point because it is far) is Topic 30's atom SPA3-004, and why the Sun looks bigger and brighter than every other star is SPA3-005. L01 says "It looks small only because it is far, far away" once and explains nothing more; L02 says "the other stars are far, far away" and "the Sun is the star closest to Earth" as bare facts.
My recommendation: keep the one line and the two bare facts; Topic 30 gives the mechanism.
Does L01 keep the stove ring as the everyday glowing-hot thing?
the atom says "glowing gas". A child's model of glowing is fire, and the brief asks that the Sun be shown as not on fire (no wood, no air). The lesson needs one glowing thing that is not a fire: a stove ring glowing red because it is very hot (a photo). It costs one photo and two idea lines, and the sentence "Very hot things glow" is the only mechanism-shaped line in the topic.
My recommendation: keep — without it "glowing gas" is a phrase, not a picture.
Do the nine question types stand, with both hard types as text entry?
three fact atoms give few question moves, so the sheet stops at nine (≤ 10; ≤ 2 alone-types per atom). No numeric entry is honest here (nothing is counted or read off a scale), so both hard types are text entry: the one daytime thing that is the same kind of thing as the night-time stars (Sun), and the kind of matter the Sun is made of (gas). Five exemplars were re-instanced after the non-author review (29 Sep): one had been Topic 15's attached question with a word changed. Coverage table on records/TYPES_G3T29.md.
My recommendation: approve as written.
Topic 29 at a glance — 3 lessons
| Lesson | Opens on | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|
| L01 | The Sun is a huge ball of glowing gas | Here is Jax on the beach early in the morning. | video + article |
| L02 | The Sun is a star | It is a clear night. | video + article |
| L03 | The Sun's light carries energy to Earth | It is noon on a sunny day. | video + article |
What this topic is, in five lines
Three short lessons, one per atom, the first Space topic of the Earth & Space strand, in the order what the Sun IS → what it is ONE OF → what it DOES for Earth. L01: the Sun looks coin-sized but is huge (Earth drawn to size is a dot; 109 Earths across, drawn as 109 dots); it is made of gas, a kind of matter like the air, so hot that it glows (a stove ring is the everyday glowing-hot thing); it is not a rock and not a campfire (no wood, no air); nothing shines light onto it — its light is its own (the Moon is lit, Topic 13). L02, the shortest lesson in the strand: every point of light in the night sky is a star, a huge ball of glowing gas that makes its own light; that is exactly what the Sun is; up close a night-time star would look like our Sun; the Sun is the star closest to Earth. L03, on Topic 15's sentence form: the Sun's light travels to Earth in straight lines and lands on the slide; light carries energy, so the slide warms up; it lands on the sand, the sea, the grass, you; a stove and a lamp warm and light things too (a small table), so the Sun is the MAIN source, not the only one; at night the Sun is not in our sky and the slide cools; with no Sun at all the ground would stay dark and frozen.
One depiction of the Sun (a yellow-orange disc with a soft glow, no face) is drawn by one function and reused in every figure; the size figure is honest (Earth's dot is the Sun's width ÷ 109, asserted in figures.py); the real Sun is a photo (a sunrise, a filtered solar image, a sunlit field).
Applied without asking (rulings you have already given, and the coordinator's 29 Sep rulings on the review): the safety line "Never look straight at the Sun" is its own article line straight after L01's headache AND a beat of the intro video (a student who chooses the video hears it; an instruction, not teaching); the L03 attached question sits on the video's own sand and PP-7 on a metal mailbox, never Topic 15's rock; fifteen student names renamed after a course-wide check; hard PP100 items are typed (two of nine exemplars, both text entry); every attached question stands alone with its own drawing; no option bundles a verdict with a reason (thirteen claim items, all bare yes / no); every stem a positive question; colour in figures; scene changes spoken with "let's", never an imperative; the intro ends on a ready line and a poll and names no lesson; three questions on the summary; scripts at most 150 spoken words; light CARRIES energy (Topic 15's sentence form); "gas" and "a kind of matter" are Topic 20's words; the Moon is lit, not a source (Topic 13); day and night are only "the Sun is not in our sky"; "the Sun is on fire" only as a student's claim the key corrects; a headache character never appears in an item; each claim-maker used once; names grepped course-wide (six renamed after Topic 28 landed mid-session); one lesson per atom, three lessons.
The Sun is a huge ball of glowing gas L01
Here is Jax on the beach early in the morning.
The Sun comes up over the sea.
The sky, the sand and the sea all turn bright.
Jax shades his eyes.
'What is the Sun, really?' he asks.
Is it on fire, like a campfire?
Is it a rock, like Earth?
It looks about the size of a coin.
But how big is it, really?
The Sun looks small only because it is far, far away.
Up close it is huge: more than a hundred Earths side by side would fit across it.
The Sun is made of gas, a kind of matter like the air, and that gas is so hot that it glows.
It is not a rock and it is not a campfire: no wood, no air.
Nothing shines light onto the Sun.
It makes its own light.
Video: the 109 Earth-dots filling in across the Sun; the stove ring then the Sun; the campfire beside the Sun with the two chips; the Sun's rays leaving it and landing on the Moon — video and article. The safety line is in the article and the intro video (L01's script is at its 150-word cap).
Part 1 — SPA3-001 — State that the Sun is a huge ball of glowing gas that makes its own light
Part 1q — quiz, 12 items
The Sun is a star L02
It is a clear night.
Cassia lies on her back in the garden.
The Sun is not in the sky.
Thousands of tiny points of light are.
'What are they?' she asks.
'Are they anything like our Sun?'
Every tiny point of light in the night sky is a star.
A star is a huge ball of glowing gas that makes its own light.
That is exactly what the Sun is.
The Sun is a star, like every star in the night sky.
The other stars are far, far away.
Up close, one would look like our Sun.
Video: a few stars glowing brighter in turn; the Sun ball appearing beside the star field; one star ringed and the dashed line to the Sun ball — video and article.
Part 1 — SPA3-007 — State that the Sun is a star, the same kind of thing as the stars in the night sky
Part 1q — quiz, 11 items
The Sun's light carries energy to Earth L03
It is noon on a sunny day.
Piet touches the metal slide in the park.
The slide is hot.
Nobody has touched it all morning.
Nothing hot was near it.
So where did the warmth come from?
The Sun's light travels to Earth in straight lines and lands on the slide.
Light carries energy, so the slide warms up.
It lands on the sand, the sea, the grass and you: everywhere it lands, it carries energy there.
A stove or a lamp gives some warmth and light too, but most of the energy reaching Earth comes from the Sun.
At night the Sun is not in our sky, and the slide cools down.
With no Sun at all, the ground would stay dark and frozen.
Video: the straight lines running from the Sun to Earth, then to the slide; the table's cocoa row turning red and the two Sun rows green; the slide at night (no Moon — it is lit by sunlight); the frozen Earth — video and article.
Part 1 — SPA3-002 — Explain that the Sun is the main source of the energy reaching Earth
Part 1q — quiz, 12 items
Language decisions
- The atoms' words: "a huge ball of glowing gas", "makes its own light", "a star", "the same kind of thing as the stars in the night sky", "the main source of the energy reaching Earth".
- Light CARRIES energy (Topic 15): "the Sun's light carries energy to the slide"; never "light energy", never "a form of energy". Where light lands, the thing warms up.
- "Gas" and "a kind of matter" are Topic 20's; "the Sun is made of gas, a kind of matter like the air". "Matter" is used only there.
- A light source MAKES light (Topic 13); the Moon does not make light, sunlight lands on it and it is lit up; "nothing shines light onto the Sun".
- Day and night: only "the Sun is not in our sky". No turning Earth, no "the Sun goes down / goes away / sets" as an explanation ("comes up" is used for the sunrise scene as what a child sees, with no cause given).
- "The Sun is on fire" appears only as a student's claim the key corrects; "burns" is said only of a campfire; the Sun's gas "glows".
- Distance is a bare fact ("far, far away"; "the star closest to Earth"); why far things look small is Topic 30's.
- Not said anywhere: "gravity", "force", "planet", "orbit", "space" (as a place), "energy source" as a label, "solar", "plasma", "million", "billion", "nuclear", "burning" of the Sun, "lift", "leak".
- Openers vary: L01 "Here's Jax…", L02 "It's a clear night.", L03 "It's noon on a sunny day."; contractions in scripts and headaches.
- Safety line: "Never look straight at the Sun. Its light is far too bright for your eyes." — its own line straight after L01's headache, and a beat of the intro video; not repeated in L02 or L03.
PP100 type sheet (TYPE_SHEET_ONLY; James's 28 Sep night ruling: hard items are typed)
Nine types, nine exemplars, at most two alone-types per atom; seven four-option MCQs (easy and medium) and two typed hard items (both text entry — nothing in this topic is counted or read off a scale, so numeric entry would be forced). Coverage table in records/TYPES_G3T29.md.
Figures
25 figures: 19 svg (the Sun by one drawer, the honest size figure, the light lines, the table, the star fields by fixed seeds, the rule cards, the item drawings), 5 photos (a sunrise over the sea, a filtered solar image, a glowing stove ring, a starry night, a sunlit field), 1 cartoon (Piet at the slide). Every figure has an IMAGE_BRIEFS entry and an IMAGE_KINDS entry; people and hands are never glyphs; no cartoon Sun with a face anywhere; item figures carry no chip and their blind comments give the scene, never the answer.
Deliberately not taught
Why the far stars look like dots and why the Sun looks bigger and brighter than every other star (SPA3-004, SPA3-005, Topic 30); that stars differ in size and brightness (SPA3-003); the telescope (SPA3-006); day and night as Earth's turning (Topic 31 / Grade 4); the Sun's distance in numbers; what makes the Sun's gas hot (no mechanism at any grade of this course); plants and food chains as users of the Sun's energy (Life strand, LIF3-050); the water cycle's Sun clause (EAR4-056); the Moon's phases; the planets and the word "planet" (Topic 31); "solar system" (Topic 31).
This grade’s course architecture — open only if you want the whole map
Skill: course-build → atomise (architecture, step 6b gate) → write-like-james @ acc4fb6
Grade 3 Science — course architecture v3 (James's rulings of 25 September, plus Olivia Mullins's sequencing)
Read this in five minutes. Grade 3 Science is ONE course with a fixed order; nobody picks strands. It arranges the 183 Grade 3 atoms into four strands and forty-two small topics, each with its own mixed practice, summary video and PP100. Nothing below writes a lesson sentence. The atoms stay where they are: the Science Knowledge Graph's 3-5 registers.
Rulings recorded (James, 25 September 2026)
- Strand order: Physics, Matter, Earth & Space, Life. James: "I don't think it matters hugely … Happy to go with 1 Physics 2 Matter 3 Earth and space 4 Life. That works well." Strands may be intermingled later if a reason appears; none does yet.
- Grade 3 is one course. "We're not going to allow students to pick any strand … we need to structure Grade 3 as we think Grade 3 should be structured best." v1's line about students choosing strands was wrong and is gone.
- Topic 1 is the pilot. "That topic 1, I think, works as a good pilot."
- Small topics. "3 atoms is fine for testing. PP100s on quite granular stuff is absolutely fine … A 4-atom topic and a 5-atom topic is great. 9 is too many, really … if something's got 9 atoms, we should be considering splitting it." So sound, soil, fossils and natural resources each stand alone, and every v1 topic of nine or more was split (Card 2). Topics 1 and 2 keep 8 and 7 lessons because James approved Topic 1 as it stands and Topic 2 is one chain about speed; both are flagged as split candidates once their PP100 data arrives.
- Forces opens with Earth's pull and magnets, before the word "force" (Olivia Mullins call, 25 September; James: "I think I'll follow that"). Topics 3 and 4 teach the two non-touching pulls with no talk of forces; Topic 5 coins "force" on both of them and on the hand push together, so the hand push never becomes the whole category. Her two classroom misconceptions (Earth pulls only on your feet; "balanced" is a kind of force) are in the register and the lessons.
- States of matter start with air (Olivia): air takes up space → gases spread → liquids → solids → the sort.
Applied from the earlier rulings: four strands; Motion before Forces before Energy; Scientific Reasoning atoms taught inside the topics that use them; one intro video per strand and per topic, each teaching nothing; one atom, one lesson, both video and article; a summary video before every PP100; PP100 banks of at least fifty items tagged by depth of reasoning; the Forces topics reuse the golden pack; the language rules (Earth's pull, carriers not forms, no "leak" or "lift").
Card 1 — The strands and their order
The call: Physics → Matter → Earth & Space → Life, each with its own intro video and its own end-of-strand test.
| Strand | Topics | Atoms | Why it sits here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Physics | 1-15 | 64 | Motion first: what you can see, before the invisible cause. Energy last: "faster means more energy" needs speed. |
| Matter | 16-21 | 22 (+7 Scientific Reasoning) | Uses the measuring tools and feeds Earth's water cycle in Grade 4. |
| Earth & Space | 22-31 | 41 (+4 Scientific Reasoning) | Weather uses tables and graphs; "the Sun powers Earth" must precede food chains. |
| Life | 32-42 | 43 | Ends the year; leans on Space (the Sun), Forces (Earth's pull) and Matter (properties). |
Scientific Reasoning's 13 atoms are spread through Topics 1, 16, 17, 22, 23 and 25 (Card 4). Total 183 lessons.
Card 2 — The topics
The call: forty-two topics, most of three to six lessons; a mixed mastery practice set, a summary video and a PP100 at the end of every one.
| # | Topic (student-facing title) | Atoms (in teaching order) | Lessons | The big idea it serves |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Physics | ||||
| 1 | Where is it? Did it move? | MOT3-001, 002, 003, 004, 005, 006, 007, 008 (+ SR3-020, 021 inside L07/L08) | 8 | You say where something is with a landmark; moving means its position changed; motions can repeat |
| 2 | Fast and slow | MOT3-020, 021, 022, 023, 024, 025, 026 | 7 | Faster means farther in the same time, or the same distance in less time |
| 3 | Earth pulls things down | FOR3-021, 029, 030, 028, 022 (+ a closing lesson naming gravity) | 6 | Earth pulls every object, all the time, straight down, on every part of it, without touching; a strong enough pull can beat it; the pull's name is gravity (JM 28 Sep 2026; no word "force" yet) |
| 4 | Magnets | FOR3-023, 024, 025 | 3 | A magnet pulls steel without touching; two magnets pull or push; use a magnet to solve a problem (no word "force" yet) |
| 5 | What a force is | FOR3-012, 001, 008, 006 | 4 | Earth's pull, a magnet's pull and your push are all forces; push or pull; on one object; in one direction |
| 6 | Forces that touch, and forces that don't | FOR3-020, 027, 026 | 3 | Some forces act without touching: Earth, magnets, a rubbed balloon; most pushes touch |
| 7 | Pushes and pulls change things | FOR3-002, 003, 004, 005, 007 | 5 | A push or pull starts, stops, turns or squashes; you can test it |
| 8 | Strong or weak: drawing a force | FOR3-009, 010, 011 | 3 | A stronger push makes a bigger change; an arrow shows a force's direction and strength |
| 9 | Balanced forces | FOR3-040, 041, 042, 043, 045 | 5 | Several forces act at once; balanced forces leave motion as it is, still or steady |
| 10 | Unbalanced forces | FOR3-044, 046, 047 | 3 | Unbalanced forces speed up, slow down or turn |
| 11 | Energy: what has it, how it travels | ENE3-001, 002, 003, 004, 005, 034 | 6 | Energy makes things happen; light, sound and electricity carry it; faster means more |
| 12 | Sound | ENE3-030, 031, 032 | 3 | Sound comes from vibration and travels to your ear |
| 13 | Light: sources, straight lines, shadows | ENE3-010, 011, 012, 017 | 4 | Light comes from a source, travels straight, makes shadows, must reach the eye |
| 14 | Light bounces, bends or soaks in | ENE3-013, 014, 015, 016 | 4 | Reflection, refraction, absorption, sorted |
| 15 | Light and heat | ENE3-020, 021, 033 | 3 | Light-givers give heat; rubbing makes heat; light carries energy |
| Matter | ||||
| 16 | Describe it, sort it | SR3-001, 002, MAT3-001, 002, 003 | 5 | Observe with more than your eyes; describe an object by its properties; sort and order |
| 17 | Measuring tools | SR3-003, 004, 005, 006, 007 | 5 | Thermometer, scale, measuring jug; pick the right one; two groups can disagree |
| 18 | Which has more? | MAT3-004, 062, 005, 006 | 4 | More mass, more space, warmer, decided by a measurement; MAT3-062 "everything takes up space" (JM ruling on Olivia's comment, 28 Sep 2026) sits before the space comparison |
| 19 | Sinks, floats, sticks to a magnet: choosing materials | MAT3-007, 008, 060, 061 | 4 | Test a property, then pick the material for the job |
| 20 | Solids, liquids and gases | MAT3-063, 064, 065, 022, 023, 021, 020, 024 | 8 | Air first (Olivia's order): air is something you can feel; it is made of tiny pieces too small to see; so is every kind of matter; air takes up space; gases spread out to fill their space; liquids take their container's shape; solids keep theirs; then the sort with the awkward cases. MAT3-063, 064, 065 were added on 28 Sep 2026 (JM's rulings on Olivia's comments) before MAT3-022 in the chain; eight lessons is over JM's 3–6 size, so the Topic 20 build record (decision 1) proposes a split after MAT3-022 into "Air is something" (4) and "Solids, liquids and gases" (4), renumbering Matter to 16–22, Earth & Space 23–32, Life 33–43 — nothing after Topic 19 is authored, so the renumbering costs nothing now |
| 21 | Heating and cooling | MAT3-040, 041, 042, 043, 044, 045, 046 | 7 | Heating and cooling change the state but it is the same water (split candidate: melting/freezing vs evaporating/condensing) |
| Earth & Space | ||||
| 22 | Measuring the weather | EAR3-017, 018, 019, SR3-010, EAR3-020, SR3-011 | 6 | Three instruments, a weather diary, reading it back |
| 23 | Weather over a season, and far away | SR3-012, EAR3-022, 023, 021, 024 | 5 | A season's records make a chart; the chart predicts; other places differ |
| 24 | Volcanoes, earthquakes, landslides | EAR3-007, 010, 008, 011, 009, 012 | 6 | What each one is, then how it changes the land fast |
| 25 | Dangerous weather | EAR3-013, 014, SR3-022 | 3 | Weather can do damage; a defence holds it back; pick the sensible cause |
| 26 | Soil | EAR3-001, 002, 003, 004 | 4 | Soil is broken rock plus dead things |
| 27 | Fossils | EAR3-029, 030, 031, 032, 033 | 5 | A few dead things last as fossils and tell of the past |
| 28 | Using and conserving natural resources | EAR3-040, 041, 042, 043 | 4 | Everything you own started as a natural resource; some run short |
| 29 | The Sun | SPA3-001, 007, 002 | 3 | A huge glowing ball of gas; a star; the source of Earth's energy |
| 30 | The stars | SPA3-003, 004, 005, 006 | 4 | Stars differ; they look like dots because they are far; telescopes show more |
| 31 | The solar system | SPA3-010, 011, 012, 013, 014 | 5 | Earth orbits the Sun with seven other planets; the Moon orbits Earth |
| Life | ||||
| 32 | Alive or not | LIF3-001, 007, 008, 009, 002 | 5 | Living things grow, feed, move and make more; sort living from non-living |
| 33 | What living things need | LIF3-003, 004, 005, 006 | 4 | Food, water, air and a place that suits them |
| 34 | Backbone or no backbone | LIF3-010, 011, 070 | 3 | Grouping by shared features; vertebrates, invertebrates, arthropods |
| 35 | The five vertebrate groups | LIF3-015, 016, 017, 018, 019, 012 | 6 | Mammal, bird, reptile, amphibian, fish, then the sort |
| 36 | Eggs, body parts and senses | LIF3-013, 020, 027 | 3 | Egg-layers or live birth; body parts do survival jobs; animals sense, then respond |
| 37 | How plants make new plants | LIF3-071, 072, 014, 024 | 4 | Seeds, spores, the sort, the flower's job |
| 38 | Plant parts and their jobs | LIF3-021, 022, 023 | 3 | Roots, stem, leaves |
| 39 | Plants respond | LIF3-025, 026, 028 | 3 | Stems grow to the light, roots grow down; plants respond by growing, animals by moving |
| 40 | Life cycles and family likeness | LIF3-030, 031, 040, 041, 042 | 5 | Every life runs in a cycle; offspring take after their parents but differ |
| 41 | Food chains | LIF3-050, 051, 052 | 3 | Every food chain starts with the Sun; remove a link and the rest changes |
| 42 | Living together and coping with change | LIF3-060, 061, 062, 063 | 4 | Groups, places and seasons decide who survives |
Totals: 183 lessons, 42 practice sets, 42 PP100s (banks of at least 50 items each), 4 strand tests (after Topics 15, 21, 31, 42), 1 end-of-grade test.
Why this grouping
- Every prerequisite edge points backwards in this order. Checked atom by atom in the assembled files; no forward reference.
- Animal topics (33-35) and plant topics (36-38) are separate, as James asked; the plant-versus-animal response contrast (LIF3-028) closes Topic 38 because it needs both sides taught.
- Topics 3 and 4 teach Earth's pull and magnets without the word force; Topic 5 coins it on all three kinds (Olivia's sequence). Topic 8 carries the two force-arrow atoms so Topics 9 and 10 can draw balanced and unbalanced forces.
- Topic 24 puts "what a volcano is" straight before "volcanoes change the land fast", and the same for earthquakes and landslides: what it is, then what it does.
What changes: the folder gets grade3/topicNN_build/ per topic; Topic 1's blueprint is approved; Topic 1 is built first.
Card 3 — Topic 1 is the pilot (approved)
The call: pilot "Where is it? Did it move?" end to end — 8 lessons, an attached question per video, a ten-item quiz after each, mixed practice, summary video, PP100 — before any other topic starts.
- It is the first thing a Grade 3 student meets, so the whole format ladder gets tried where the stakes are lowest.
- It holds a fact, four sorts, two routines and a prediction. Every check type the course needs appears once.
- Its quiz items are drawings of everyday scenes, so the figure pipeline for young grades gets tested too.
- Topics 3 to 10 follow, reusing the golden Forces pack where its lessons match (push or pull, force on one object, strength, direction, more than one force, the balanced and unbalanced lessons).
Card 4 — Scientific Reasoning is taught where it is used
The call: each of the 13 Scientific Reasoning atoms is a lesson inside the topic that first needs it, with its check there; no separate strand, no separate test.
| SR atom | Host topic | Why there |
|---|---|---|
| SR3-001 Observe with more than your eyes; SR3-002 Observation or idea about it? | 16 Describe it, sort it | describing an object's properties is observing |
| SR3-003 Read a thermometer; SR3-004 Measure mass with a scale; SR3-005 Measure the volume of a liquid; SR3-006 Pick the right measuring tool; SR3-007 Two groups, two different answers | 17 Measuring tools | the tools before "which has more?" uses them |
| SR3-010 Record results in a table; SR3-011 Find a value in a table | 22 Measuring the weather | the weather diary is the first table students fill and read back |
| SR3-012 Read a pictograph or bar graph | 23 Weather over a season | the graph before the graphing routine |
| SR3-020 Spot the pattern; SR3-021 Use the pattern to predict | 1 Where is it? Did it move? (inside L07 and L08) | the swing's repeat is the pattern |
| SR3-022 Choose the sensible cause | 25 Dangerous weather | first place students pick a cause for an event |
Card 5 — Tests and benchmarks
The call: a PP100 per topic; a static end-of-strand test per strand (some free response); one static end-of-grade test; all Grade 3 tests are our own banks, seeded from released grade-5 items filtered to Grade 3 atoms.
- No state tests science before grade 5 (D1 ruling). The released STAAR, Florida SSA and AZSCI grade-5 forms give the style and difficulty; items tagged to Grade 3 atoms seed the banks.
- The strand tests fall after Topics 15, 21, 31 and 42.
- The end-of-grade test samples all four strands with free-response items.
What happens next
Topic 1 is built as the first interactive version for James: the topic intro (video script and article), eight lessons each as a video script with animation guidance and an article with figures, one attached question per video, a ten-item quiz per lesson, mixed practice, the summary video script and the PP100 bank. Topic 3 follows, reusing the golden pack.