Skill: course-build → review-accuracy (step 27, misconception-proofing) → atomise (misconception pass, Guide Part 4) → vault-sync → write-like-james @ 58d971a

Physics misconceptions audit — Grade 3 Topics 1–13 (28 Sep 2026, night)

You asked for a physics-specific misconception checker, built from research on what 7-to-11-year-olds actually believe, and run across our physics content. It exists (build_tools_physics_misconceptions.py, 58 misconceptions, 121 planting phrasings, 159 breaking cases), it ran over eleven built topics tonight, and this page is what it found. No content file was edited. The authors act on your rulings below.

Decisions I need from you

1. Does Topic 3 keep "beats Earth's pull" and "beat gravity", or switch to "stronger than Earth's pull, so it starts to move up"?

Topic 3 says a push or pull "beats" Earth's pull 55 times, and eight lines reason "it went up, so the pull was strong enough to beat Earth's pull".

That frame teaches that going up proves the upward force is bigger. Clement (1982) found most first-year physics students believe exactly that about a rising coin.

Topic 9 will teach that a thing rising at a steady speed has balanced forces, so Topic 9 would have to unteach Topic 3.

The atom FOR3-022 itself says "overcome", so this is your call, not the authors'.

My recommendation: switch to the comparative ("your pull is stronger than Earth's pull on the book, so the book starts to move up") and add one non-example: the ball leaves your hand, keeps going up while nothing pushes it up, slows, and comes back — Earth pulled it the whole way.

Choices: Keep "beat" / Switch the wording only / Switch the wording and add the non-example.

2. May Topic 3's closing lesson say "Gravity pulls the apple down", or must it stay "Earth pulls … that pull is called gravity"?

Your rule of 25 Sep says gravity names the happening and is never the subject of "pulls".

Topic 3 L06, the lesson you asked for to name gravity, makes gravity the puller 35 times ("Gravity pulls everything straight down, all the time").

My recommendation: keep Earth as the puller and gravity as the name, in one frame — "Earth pulls the apple down. That pull is called gravity." — and let the quiz ask "Is Earth pulling on the vase?" rather than "Is gravity pulling?".

Choices: Rewrite L06 to "Earth pulls" / Allow "gravity pulls" at grade 3 and amend the rule.

3. Should Topic 7's still-object lines say "Nobody gives the swing a push or a pull" instead of "Nothing pushes or pulls it"?

Topic 7 L01 and L05 say "nothing pushes or pulls" the swing, the nail, the door, the car — 14 lines about still objects.

Topic 3 has just taught that Earth pulls every object all the time, and Topic 9 (FOR3-041) will teach that a still object has forces on it. The line contradicts the first and plants the belief the second must remove.

My recommendation: name the missing person, not the missing force: "Nobody gives the swing a push or a pull, so it stays still."

Choices: Yes, reword now / Leave until Topic 9 is built / Another wording.

4. Do we close the five one-item gaps now, as quiz or PP100 items, with no new lessons?

The five: two balls, heavy and light, dropped together land together (Topic 3); a runner who is ahead only because she started first (Topic 2); the Moon is not a source of light (Topic 13 — only 3% of 4th graders know this); a tap heard through the desk with your ear on the wood (Topic 12, where "through the air" is the only medium ever named, 60 times); one line on where the wind-up frog's energy went (Topic 11).

My recommendation: all five, as items, before the type sheets go out; none needs a lesson.

Choices: All five / Pick from the list / None now.

Rulings you have already given, applied without asking: Topic 8 measures a stronger push by how far the car rolled (18 lines); your MVP ruling "avoid conflating distance with force" stands, so the authors change "rolls farther" to "speeds off faster" and re-key the two "how far does it roll" items on speed. Distractors that carry a misconception ("The scooter's push ran out", "Kai says a magnet pulls anything made of metal") are the trap answers doing their job and are not findings.

Takeaways

• Seven of eleven built topics plant nothing. Topics 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 12 and 13 have no sentence that states a catalogued misconception. The hits sit in four repeated frames, not scattered slips: Topic 3's "beat" (55) and "gravity pulls" (35), Topic 7's "nothing pushes or pulls it" (14), Topic 8's "farther" (18).
• The two topics most exposed to the famous ones are not built yet. Topics 9 and 10 (balanced and unbalanced forces) are where "a force keeps things moving", "balanced means still", "a balanced force" and "the table just blocks" live. The checker should run on their blueprints, not after their prose.
• What the course already confronts well: magnets and "all metals" (Topic 4, aluminium can); seeing needs light from the object to the eye, sealed box, eyes open (Topic 13); a force is not inside the object (Topic 5); a rolling ball nobody touches keeps rolling straight, and a scooter "does not carry a push inside it that can run out" (Topic 7); Earth pulls the still book, the rising ball, your nose and your hair (Topic 3).
• The biggest single gap is in Topic 3, and it is the same one as Decision 1. Nothing in the topic shows a thing going up while nothing pushes it up. Without that case, "beat" is the only model a child has for how anything rises.
• Fifteen gaps in total, of which five are one-item closers (Decision 4), three are the Earth-versus-magnet contrast (Topics 3 and 6 never say "a magnet pulls steel; Earth pulls the wood and the water too"), and the rest are grade 4-5 rows listed so nobody re-reports them.

The checker's summary table

Strings = student-facing sentences scanned (article, script, headache, forest, stems, options, feedback, why, practice, PP100). Inducing = sentences that assert a catalogued misconception, by severity. Negated or asked = the phrase appears but is denied or is a question. Claims and distractors = the phrase is a student's claim or a wrong option. Exposed = misconceptions the topic's atoms make live. Gaps = exposed and never confronted.

The top five gaps across the physics topics

1. Going up means the pull won (GRA-07, Topic 3). Fifty-five "beat" sentences and no case of a thing rising with nothing pushing it up. Closes it: the thrown ball after it leaves the hand; later, Topic 9's crane box rising at a steady speed.
2. A still thing has nothing pushing or pulling it (FOR-03, Topics 3 and 7). Topic 7 says it outright 14 times; Topic 3 says the table, shelf or sill "is in the way" 21 times (the support as a barrier, Minstrell 1982), which is acceptable before "force" is coined only if Topic 9 then says the table pushes up. Closes it: Topic 7's reword (Decision 3) and Topic 9's book-on-table lesson with both forces named.
3. Heavier things fall faster (GRA-03, Topic 3). Held from age 5 into university (Driver 1994); Topic 3 never drops two things together, and its "heavy box" examples feed it. Closes it: one item — a heavy ball and a light ball let go together land together.
4. Sound only travels through air (SND-02, Topic 12). "Through the air" is the only medium named, about 60 times; no wall, water or desk. Closes it: one item or one line — ear on the desk, a tap at the far end sounds loud through the wood.
5. The one in front is going faster (MOT-02, Topic 2). Piaget's oldest speed finding; every Topic 2 race starts together, so "ahead" never gets separated from "faster". Closes it: one item — the runner ahead had a head start and is being caught.

Next in line: the Moon as a light source (LGT-06, Topic 13); where the frog's energy went (ENE-03, Topic 11: "no more energy to give" 24 times, never "where it went"); Earth versus the magnet (GRA-08 and MAG-06, Topics 3 and 6).

Per topic

Topic 1 — Where is it? Did it move?

• Inducing language: none.
• Confronted: MOT-01 "if I didn't see it move, it didn't move" — the slow snail and the tree's shadow (L04, quiz item on the shadow).
• Gaps: none.

Topic 2 — Fast and slow

• Inducing language: none.
• Confronted: MOT-03 "farther means faster" — the lexicon line "Faster means farther in the same time" and the same-distance-less-time lesson.
• Gap: MOT-02 the one ahead is faster. Every comparison starts the movers together. Proposed item: "Two girls run across the yard. Mia started first and is ahead. Sam is catching her up. Who is faster?" — Sam; the why names the head start.

Topic 3 — Earth pulls things down

• Inducing language, high: GRA-07 "beat / beats Earth's pull" (45) and "beat / beats gravity" (9), plus "the boy's pull won" (1). Reword (Decision 1): "Your pull is stronger than Earth's pull on the book, so the book starts to move up." "Not strong enough to beat" becomes "Earth's pull on the rock is stronger than his pull, so the rock stays on the ground."
• Inducing language, medium: GRA-05 "gravity pulls / pulled" (35, all in L06). Reword (Decision 2): "Earth pulls the apple down. That pull is called gravity." GRA-07 "went up, so the pull was strong enough to beat" (8): "started to move up, so the upward pull was stronger at that moment".
• Inducing language, low (watch): FOR-03 "the table / shelf / sill is in the way" (21). Leave until Topic 9, which must then say the table pushes the book up as hard as Earth pulls it down.
• Student claims carrying a phrase (3): "Ade says gravity lets go of the ball" and two like it — keys correct them; fine.
• Confronted (7): GRA-01 Earth pulls the still book; GRA-02 Earth pulls the rising ball down; GRA-05 "Earth's pull is called gravity" (lexicon); GRA-06 the upside-down girl's hair; GRA-10 "what pulled it? Earth"; FOR-09 the suitcase that stays put while she pulls; FOR-03 "your hand pulls it up, and Earth pulls it down" (summary).
• Gaps (5): GRA-07 the thing that keeps rising with nothing pushing it (Decision 1); GRA-03 heavier falls faster — one item, two balls dropped together; GRA-08 / MAG-06 Earth is not a magnet — one line in the summary or in Topic 6: "A magnet pulls steel. Earth pulls the wooden block, the water and you."; GRA-04 no gravity in space — leave to grade 5 unless a PP100 item wants the Moon ("astronauts on the Moon hop up and come down").

Topic 4 — Magnets

• Inducing language: none (two "True or false: a magnet has to touch…" stems and "Does a magnet pull everything?" are questions, not assertions).
• Confronted (5): MAG-01 all metals — the aluminium can; MAG-02 must touch — the clip jumps the gap; MAG-05 always stick — turn one round, they push apart; MAG-06 / GRA-08 — "A magnet does not pull plastic, wood, paper or aluminum."
• Gap: MAG-03 magnets need air / no pull under water (40% of 9-14s, Bar & Zinn 1989). Proposed item: "A steel paperclip lies at the bottom of a glass of water. A magnet is held against the outside of the glass. What happens?" — the clip moves to the magnet.

Topic 5 — What a force is

• Inducing language: none. (Your own MVP item "True or false: one force can act in more than one direction at the same time" is a claim stem; key corrects it.)
• Confronted (4): FOR-04 non-living pushers (Earth, the magnet); FOR-09 the force with no movement; FOR-10 "acts on the swing, not on the girl"; FOR-11 one direction.
• Gaps: none.

Topic 6 — Forces that touch, and forces that don't

• Inducing language: none.
• Confronted (2): FOR-04 Earth pulls without touching; MAG-02 the magnet never touched the clip.
• Gaps (3): GRA-08 / MAG-06 Earth versus the magnet — this is the natural home for the one-line contrast, since the lesson sorts Earth, the magnet and the rubbed balloon side by side: "All three pull without touching. The magnet pulls steel only. The balloon pulls light things only. Earth pulls everything."; GRA-04 grade 5.

Topic 7 — Pushes and pulls change things

• Inducing language, medium: FOR-03 "nothing pushes or pulls it / the swing / the nail / the door / the car" (14, L01 and L05). Reword (Decision 3): "Nobody gives the swing a push or a pull, so it stays still."
• Claims and distractors (4): "The scooter's push ran out" (distractor, L02), "Sana says the ball stopped because its push ran out" (PP100 stem) — the trap answers working.
• Confronted (4): FOR-01 "a scooter does not carry a push inside it that can run out"; FOR-02 the ball nobody touches keeps rolling; FOR-09 the squeezed clay; FOR-13 a push from the side sends it onto a new path.
• Gap: FOR-03 — the topic states the belief and never breaks it; Topic 9 will, but the reword above stops Topic 7 planting it first.

Topic 8 — Strong or weak: drawing a force

• Inducing language, medium: FOR-12 "a stronger push … rolls farther" (16) and two items keyed on "how far does it roll". Your MVP ruling applies: the change in motion is speed; "the car speeds off faster".
• Confronted: FOR-12 partly — "rolls farther and faster" carries both words; the fix drops "farther".
• Gap: FOR-11 one arrow, one direction — Topic 5 confronts it; one line in the arrow lesson ("one force, one arrow, one direction") closes it here too.

Topic 11 — Energy: what has it, how it travels

• Inducing language, low: ENE-03 "no more energy to give" (24). True, and one line short of where it went.
• Confronted (5): ENE-01 the wind-up toy has energy; ENE-02 the tight spring, still, has energy to give; ENE-04 / ENE-06 / ENE-07 electricity carries energy along the wires, not through the air.
• Gaps (2): ENE-03 where the energy went — proposed line after the frog stops: "The energy went into moving the legs and warming the spring a little."; ENE-05 force versus energy — the topic follows five force topics and never separates the words; one line in L02: "A push is a force. The push started the car moving. Now that it moves, the car has energy."

Topic 12 — Sound

• Inducing language: none.
• Confronted (5): SND-01 the buzzing ruler shakes back and forth; SND-04 Selin at the back of the hall hears it too; SND-05 the boy not looking at the dog still hears the bark; SND-07 farther from the sound, the less it shakes; ENE-06 the drum's sound carries energy to the rice.
• Gaps (2): SND-02 air is the only medium ever named (about 60 sentences) — one item: "Ali puts his ear on the desk. Zara taps the far end. Does Ali hear the tap?" — yes, the vibration travels through the wood; SND-03 sound in space — grade 4-5 unless one PP100 item wants it.

Topic 13 — Light: sources, straight lines, shadows

• Inducing language: none.
• Confronted (6): LGT-01 you see only when light from it reaches your eye; LGT-02 the sealed box, no light at all, sees nothing; LGT-03 light travels; LGT-04 the bent tube; LGT-05 the object blocks the light, shadow on the far side; LGT-07 light comes from the shelves to his eyes.
• Gaps (2): LGT-06 the Moon as a source — ENE3-010 is "name the source", and only 3% of 4th graders pick the Moon as a non-source; one item: "Which of these makes its own light: the Sun, a candle, the Moon, a firefly?"; LGT-08 shadow size by light position — grade 5 (SPA5), deliberately omitted.

Deliberately omitted at grade 3 (so nobody re-reports them)

Third-law "the bigger one pushes harder" (FOR-07, grade 5); friction as a helper (FOR-08, grade 4); bigger magnet is stronger and pull falls with distance (MAG-04, MAG-07, grade 4); gravity stronger higher up (GRA-09, grade 5); cold things have no energy (ENE-09, grades 4-5); louder means higher (SND-06, grade 4 pitch); light unchanged through glass (LGT-09, Topic 14); shadow length by Sun height (LGT-08, grade 5); no gravity in space and sound in space (GRA-04, SND-03) unless a PP100 item wants them.

What happens next

You rule on the four questions. The authors apply the rulings through the topics' hand-over folders (write-lesson and write-mcqs), the checker re-runs on each changed topic, and every changed item gets its two cold reads. Topics 9 and 10 carry a "misconceptions" line per exposed row in their blueprints before any prose. The catalogue, the rule and the two skill steps are in the vault (commits 2b1d965 and 58d971a).

Depth: how the checker works

• physics_misconceptions.json holds 58 rows in seven domains: Motion and speed (3), Forces and motion (13), Earth's pull (10), Magnets (7), Energy (9), Sound (7), Light (9). Each row: the child's words, the ages, the evidence, the planting wording and the breaking case as prose; then regexes — inducing (121 patterns, each with a severity and a proposed reword) and confront (159 patterns); and the grade 3-5 atoms whose lessons expose a student to it.
• build_tools_physics_misconceptions.py imports each topic's content module, walks every student-facing string, and (a) reports each inducing match as INDUCING, negated, question, claim or distractor — a negation just before the phrase, a question sentence, a "True or false" or "X says" stem, or a non-keyed option is not a finding; (b) marks a topic exposed to a row when a lesson's atom is in the row's list, and confronted when any non-distractor string matches a confront pattern. Exit 0 always. --json dumps the findings; --md prints the vault catalogue's tables, so the vault and the checker share one source.
• Limits: the regexes catch phrasing, not meaning. A pass is not proof; a confront match is one sentence, not a whole sequence. The screen cues (drawing directions) are scanned but reported separately; tonight they raised one Topic 11 cue and nothing else.
• Run tonight over grade3/topic0[1-8]_build/content/G3T0?.py and topic1[1-3]_build; Topics 9 and 10 have no content file and were skipped.

Depth: sources behind the catalogue

AAAS Project 2061 item bank (Force and Motion, Energy); Driver, Squires, Rushworth & Wood-Robinson 1994; Driver, Guesne & Tiberghien 1985; Keeley's Uncovering Student Ideas probes (Talking About Gravity, Apple on a Desk, Dropping Balls, Rolling Marbles, Apple in the Dark, Can It Reflect Light?, Making Sound, Magnets in Water); the SPACE project reports (Liverpool and King's, 1990-98); Ioannides & Vosniadou 2002; Clement 1982; Minstrell 1982; Bar, Zinn and colleagues 1989-97; Skamp 2004; the FCI taxonomy (Hestenes 1992) where it reaches children; Feher & Rice 1988 and Piaget 1930 on shadows; Eaton, Anderson & Smith 1984 on light and seeing; Erickson 1994 and Barrow 1987 on magnets; Watts 1983, Solomon 1983 and the 2023 Frontiers video study of 6-8-year-olds on energy; Osborne 1983 and Shipstone 1984 on current; Sahin et al. 2008 on light sources; Pine, Messer & St John 2001; Ofsted 2021 and 2023; MOSART; IOPSpark; Allen 2014. Full list with what each contributed: the vault catalogue.