Skill: write-like-james @ cb79e2e · the build: write-lesson, write-mcqs, write-video-script @ cb79e2e
Topic 30 "The stars" — your read (29 September 2026)
The second Space topic, straight after The Sun. Four lessons: stars are not all the same; every star except the Sun looks like a dot because it is far away; the Sun looks biggest and brightest only because it is the closest; a telescope shows far more stars. Authored as you, then a non-author review (32 findings — all applied but one, noted), then a cold read of every changed item (31 of 31 keys agreed; one typed item now also accepts "glare" and "glow"). Reply by number.
The three that unblock the bank
1. Do the ten question types stand, with the typed hard tier?
Your night ruling is applied: hard is typed — the missing word in "the brighter-looking of two equal stars is ____ to Earth" (closer), and the one word for what hides the stars at noon (the Sun's bright light). Easy and medium are four-option MCQs and are the bulk.
Every atom is tested alone and in a pair; every exemplar is a fresh scene, none is a Topic 29 item, and every item star is drawn in the Sun's own colour so colour never gives the answer. The ten types, coverage, the design-move inventory
Recommendation: approve all ten.
Approve all / strike these / edit these
2. Does L04 keep its one-line why for the telescope?
The atom only asks a child to say that a telescope shows far more stars. L04 adds the reason in Topic 13's words: a far star sends only a little light; the telescope's wide opening catches much more of it and sends it to your eye. Nothing about the glass bending light (Topic 14).
Without it, the page has no answer to "the telescope pulls the stars closer", which the register names as the trap. The reviewer agrees; one line was added so a child does not expect the stars to look bigger — they stay dots, there are just more of them.
Recommendation: keep.
Keep / cut to the bare fact
3. Does L03 keep the two-things line?
"How bright a star looks depends on two things: how big and bright it is, and how far away it is." Three short lines and one card, after the rule that the Sun looks biggest only because it is closest.
It is the one sentence on the page that breaks "a faint star must be a small star" — a belief the misconception catalogue lists — and Grade 5 re-enters it as the evidence argument. A bridging line now says why "only because closest" and "two things" agree: the Sun is so much closer than every other star that being close is what decides it.
Recommendation: keep. The reviewer agrees.
Keep / cut to Grade 5
4. One word for a star in the sky across the strand: "dot" or "point of light"?
Topic 29's glossary and Topic 31's intro say "point of light"; this topic says "a tiny dot of light" throughout, because "dot" is the plainer word for eight-year-olds.
Recommendation: dot, with Topic 29's one glossary line and Topic 31's intro line changed to match.
Dot / point of light
The lessons
5. L01 Stars are not all the same — Percival by his tent sees two stars, one bright, one faint, and says every star is the same. Every star is a huge ball of glowing gas, like the Sun (Topic 29). Three stars drawn to size: a smaller star, the Sun, a bigger star. The two stars again: one looks bright, one faint. The Moon is bright, but sunlight lands on it — it makes no light of its own, so it is not a star. Quiz: drawn size pairs, drawn brightness pairs, the Sun is not the biggest star, stars are not alive. Article · script · quiz Fine / say where
6. L02 Why stars look like dots — Lysander at the roadside: a car's headlights are two tiny dots, then two big bright circles as it nears. The same street lamp near (big) and far down the road (a dot); one lamp at three distances, drawn honestly at full, half and a sixth size. A star is a huge ball of glowing gas, so far away that from Earth it is a tiny dot — building on Topic 29's "the Sun looks small only because it is far, far away". The cloud that hides stars is near; the stars are far beyond it. Quiz: a lighthouse from a boat, a plane's light, Kazu's true claim, Xavier's clouds. Article · quiz Fine / say where
7. L03 Why the Sun looks so big and bright — Georgiana at sunset: the Sun is low behind the fence, and next to it every other star is only a dot. A row of the same street lamps: the closest looks biggest and brightest. The Sun is the star closest to Earth (Topic 29); every other star is much, much farther — too far to draw, and the drawing says so. So the Sun looks bigger and brighter than every other star. Two things decide how bright a star looks. At noon the Sun's light fills the sky; the stars are still there. Quiz: Everett's true claim, same-size campfires near and far, Florence says the stars have gone (no). Article · quiz Fine / say where
8. L04 A telescope shows more stars — Zadie counts twelve stars in one patch of sky, then hundreds through a long tube: a telescope. A far star sends only a little light; the telescope's wide opening catches more and sends it to her eye, so faint stars show. The same patch drawn twice. The stars did not move, and they still look like dots — there are just far more of them. Quiz: Jarvis's "pulls the stars closer" (no), Flynn's "they were there all along" (yes), a drawn pair. Article · quiz Fine / say where
Applied without asking
Hard bank items typed; every attached question stands alone with its own drawing; no option bundles a verdict with a reason; every stem a positive question (PP-5 rewritten from "why the Moon is not a star" to "where does the Moon's light come from"); three of the nine "Is X right?" claims are true; scene changes spoken with "let's"; the intro opens on the sunset, ends on a ready line and a poll and names no lesson; three questions on the summary, each on a fresh drawing; the Sun is always compared, never bare — "next to the stars, the Sun looks big and bright" — so Topic 29's "looks small because far" stands; nobody watches the Sun; "drawn to size" is Topic 29's phrase; Earth is a dot beside the Sun as Topic 29 drew it; every drawn comparison is drawn to size and no picture, alt text or hidden note gives an answer away; colour, and no drawn people (five cartoons and three photos for David); every student name checked course-wide after the names tool was fixed; "planet" is left for Topic 31; the physics misconception checker finds nothing induced and no gap.
Also on the site
Intro and poll · summary and three questions · mixed practice · the blueprint's decisions · the type sheet
After you answer
1 → a bank of about fifty from the approved types, a second cold read, the hand-over folder for David. 2 and 3 → the lines stay or go; nothing else moves. 4 → Topic 29's glossary line and Topic 31's intro line change to the word you pick, and the register note says so. Four cross notes for the atoms wait in the knowledge-graph queue.