Topic 30 — The stars — blueprint (29 September 2026)
What I need from you: 3 decisions
Does L04 say one line about how a telescope works, or only what it shows?
SPA3-006 asks only that a student STATE that a telescope shows far more stars than eyes alone. L04 adds one line of why, kept to Topic 13's words: a far star sends only a little light; the telescope's wide opening catches more of it and sends it to your eye. How the glass bends light (Topic 14) is not said.
My recommendation: keep the one-line why — it is what stops "the telescope pulls the stars closer".
Does L01 draw other stars in their own tints?
the Sun keeps Topic 29's yellow-orange. A bigger star is drawn pale yellow-white and a smaller star orange (true of many real stars, and it keeps the Sun recognisable). No caption names a colour, so nothing rests on it.
My recommendation: keep the tints.
Does the two-things line (a star's brightness depends on its size AND its distance) stay in Grade 3?
SPA3-005 says the Sun looks biggest and brightest ONLY because it is closest. The catalogue's misconception "brightness in our sky = true size" needs the second factor named, so L03 says it in three short lines and one drawn card, and PP type 9 (hard, typed) rests on it. Grade 5 (SPA5-031) re-enters it as the NGSS evidence argument.
My recommendation: keep it; it is one sentence with two parts, and the register's chain starts here.
Topic 30 at a glance — 4 lessons
| Lesson | Opens on | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|
| L01 | Stars are not all the same | Here is Rupert by his tent on a clear night. | video + article |
| L02 | Why stars look like dots | Here is Lysander at the side of a long, straight road at night. | video + article |
| L03 | Why the Sun looks so big and bright | Here is Georgiana in the yard at the end of the day. | video + article |
| L04 | A telescope shows more stars | Here is Zadie on the balcony on a clear night. | video + article |
What this topic is, in five lines
Four short lessons, one per atom, following Topic 29 (the Sun is a huge ball of glowing gas that makes its own light; the Sun is a star; the Sun looks small only because it is far, far away; the Sun is the star closest to Earth). L01 shows that stars are not all the same — three stars to the same scale, two stars in one patch of sky, and the one boundary case (the Moon, bright but lit by the Sun). L02 builds the classic near-lamp / far-lamp case into WHY every star except the Sun looks like a dot. L03 builds the row-of-lamps case into WHY the Sun looks biggest and brightest (it is the closest), names the two things that decide how bright a star looks, and shows the day sky (the stars are still there). L04 coins "telescope" and shows one patch of sky twice: twelve stars by eye, hundreds through the telescope.
Misconceptions confronted by name (vault: Physics lessons confront the age's misconceptions by name): stars are small because they look small (L02); stars are only out at night (L03); a star's brightness in our sky = its true size (L03); the Moon is a star (L01); stars are "in the sky" like the clouds (L02); a telescope brings the star nearer (L04); stars twinkle because they are alive (L01 quiz claim). The course's physics checker finds 0 inducing phrases and 0 gaps.
Applied without asking (rulings you have already given): hard PP100 items are typed (two of ten exemplars, both text entry); every attached question stands alone with its own drawing; no option bundles a verdict with a reason; every stem a positive question; colour in figures; scene changes spoken with "let's" and never as an imperative at the viewer; the intro ends on a ready line and a poll and names no lesson; three questions on the summary; a headache character never appears in an item; a claim-maker is used once per topic; every scale drawing is honest (a star beside the Sun to the same scale; the same lamp at n times the distance drawn at 1/n the size); "twinkle" appears only inside a claim the key corrects; light is never "a form of energy"; the Moon "makes no light of its own" in Topic 13's words.
Stars are not all the same L01
Here is Rupert by his tent on a clear night.
Two stars sit side by side above the trees.
One looks bright.
The other looks faint.
Rupert says every star is the same as every other star.
Is he right?
Every star is a huge ball of glowing gas, like the Sun.
Stars are not all the same.
Some stars are bigger than the Sun.
Some stars are smaller than the Sun.
Some stars look brighter than others.
The Moon is bright, but it makes no light of its own, so it is not a star.
Video: the three discs appearing to scale; the two chips on the pair; sunlight arriving at the Moon — video and article.
Part 1 — SPA3-003 — State that stars differ in size or in how bright they appear
Part 1q — quiz, 11 items
Why stars look like dots L02
Here is Lysander at the side of a long, straight road at night.
A car is coming toward her from far away.
Its headlights look like two tiny dots.
As the car comes closer, the headlights grow into two big, bright circles.
The headlights did not change.
So what did?
The same lamp looks big when it is near and looks like a dot when it is far away.
The farther away a light is, the smaller it looks.
A star is a huge ball of glowing gas, far bigger than Earth.
A star is so far away that from Earth it looks like a tiny dot of light.
The Sun is the one star that does not look like a dot.
Video: the headlight dots growing as the car nears; the lamp at three distances; the glowing ball shrinking to a dot — video and article.
Part 1 — SPA3-004 — Explain that every star except the Sun looks like a tiny point of light because it is so far away
Part 1q — quiz, 10 items
Why the Sun looks so big and bright L03
Here is Georgiana in the yard at the end of the day.
The Sun is low in the sky, big and bright.
Georgiana knows the Sun is a star.
But every other star looks like a tiny dot.
Why does the Sun look so different?
A row of the same street lamps runs down the road.
The lamp beside you looks biggest and brightest, because it is the closest.
The Sun is the closest star to Earth.
Every other star is much, much farther away.
So the Sun looks bigger and brighter than every other star.
How bright a star looks depends on two things: how big and bright it is, and how far away it is.
By day the Sun's light fills the sky, so you cannot see the other stars, but they are still there.
Video: the lamp row with its chips; Earth, the Sun and the far stars with the break lines; the day and night panels of one patch — video and article.
Part 1 — SPA3-005 — Explain that the Sun looks bigger and brighter than every other star only because it is the closest star to Earth
Part 1q — quiz, 10 items
A telescope shows more stars L04
Here is Zadie on the balcony on a clear night.
She counts the stars in one small patch of sky: twelve.
Then she looks at the same patch through a long tube with glass in it.
Now she counts hundreds.
Where did all those stars come from?
A telescope is a tube with glass in it that you look through.
You see a star when light from it reaches your eye.
A far star sends only a little light to Earth, too little for your eye alone to see.
A telescope's wide opening catches much more of that light and sends it to your eye, so the faint star shows.
A telescope shows far more stars than your eyes alone can see.
The stars were there all along; the telescope does not move them.
Video: the patch filling with faint stars; the faint-light picture with the eye alone and then the telescope's wide opening — video and article.
Part 1 — SPA3-006 — State that a telescope reveals far more stars than the unaided eye can see
Part 1q — quiz, 10 items
Language decisions
- Topic 29's words are kept and built on: "a huge ball of glowing gas", "it makes its own light", "the Sun is a star", "the Sun looks small only because it is far, far away", "the Sun is the star closest to Earth" (recalled with "You've already seen…", never restated as this topic's rule).
- "Looks bright / faint" for how a star appears; "bigger / smaller than the Sun" for its real size; "a tiny dot of light"; "far, far away"; "much, much farther"; "the closest star to Earth"; "your eyes alone" for the unaided eye.
- The Moon in Topic 13's words: "sunlight lands on the Moon, and the Moon is lit up"; "the Moon makes no light of its own".
- Coined here: "telescope" (L04) only. "Star" is Topic 29's word.
- Never said: "gravity", "force", "planet" (Topic 31's), "light-year", "orbit", "a form of energy", "lift", "leak"; "twinkle" only inside a claim the key corrects; no figure of the Sun is "huge in the sky".
- Openers vary: "Here's Rupert…", "Here's Lysander…", "Here's Georgiana…", "Here's Zadie…"; contractions in scripts and headaches; scene changes with "Now let's…", "Now consider…".
PP100 type sheet (TYPE_SHEET_ONLY; James's 28 Sep night ruling: hard items are typed)
Ten types, ten exemplars, at most two alone-types per atom; eight four-option MCQs (easy and medium) and two typed hard items (both text entry: the one word that says where the brighter-looking of two equal stars is; the one word for what hides the stars by day). Coverage table in records/TYPES_G3T30.md.
Figures
49 figures. SVG for every drawing a comparison rests on (the scale pairs, the two-stars patches, every lamp and light pair, the lamp rows, the sky patches, the Moon lit by the Sun, the day / night pair, the faint-light picture, the rule cards); three photos (the real night sky, a real telescope, the Moon through a telescope); five cartoons (Saskia on the grass, Rupert by the tent, Lysander at the roadside, Georgiana in the yard, Zadie on the balcony). Every figure has an IMAGE_BRIEFS entry and an IMAGE_KINDS entry; people and hands are never drawn as glyphs. The Sun, a star in the sky, a star field, the Moon and Earth are Topic 29's drawers, imported. Item figures carry no verdict chip.
Deliberately not taught
Why stars twinkle (the air); how the glass in a telescope bends the light (Topic 14); star colours as a sign of heat; distances in numbers (light-years); constellations; planets among the stars (Topic 31's intro idea); why the Sun's light fills the day sky (Earth's turning is later); the NGSS 5-ESS1-1 evidence argument (SPA5-031).
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.