Two readers answered 125 items cold and agreed every key with each other and with the bank: no item treats a scar or a learned skill as passed on. What they caught was shape. In L02, the practice set and three bank items, the option that named a cause from the animal's life always wore a colon tail ("from how it lived: the daily pulling") and the parents' option never did, so the tailed option was the key every time (fixed: every where-from option in the lexicon's frame, no tail). Three bank items keyed the one option that joined two clauses; two odd-one-out items ended three options "like its parents" and the key alone did not; one Grade 3 recall keyed the longest, hedged option; all seven quiz claims were "no"; the eleven item cards printed the sorting questions already answered; and Sonia, Stella and Sylvia read as one child. All applied in v2.

Reader C then read the whole v2 bundle, 125 items, and agreed every key. Two items would not ship as they stood: PP-13, where "from the weight of the bricks" was "how he lived" said again, so two options were defensible (now a non-cause from the scene, the hot sun on the building site); and PP-39, where the key was the longest option and alone carried "so ... even though" (now one clause, "He learned to ride, so it is an acquired trait.", with the long distractor matched). One run to re-order: the first four L03 items alternated their keys (the cupboard cat moved one place). And the seven "Is X right?" claims ran yes, no, no, no, yes, no, no, so a child who always says "no" scored five of seven (a true firefly claim added in L05: five of eight). Reader C also read Sonia and Sylvia as a pair; Sonia is now Paula. All applied in v3, keys unchanged.

The science is right and the structure is right, the reviewer said: each kind of trait gets its own lesson full of examples before the sort, the names come last, and the named misconception of the sub-domain (a scar or a trained trick is inherited) is met by a lesson line and a claim item. Two things had to change, and did: the colon-tail key family (twelve key tells, fixed as one pattern); and the rule the misconception hangs on, "an acquired trait stays with the one that got it", was written in the L03 and L05 articles but spoken in neither video, though two quiz items test it (now a beat in each script and a sentence in the summary). Worth fixing, all done: a bridge from Grade 3's "feature" to "trait"; a gloss so "from the start" survives petals that show later; one dog across the five lessons (L02's running dog was Sylvia's; it is Paula's); two claims made TRUE; the item cards as fact rows; a stray "riding a bike? no" inside the inherited box of a drawn card; "a surrounding" and "an offspring" made Grade 3's own words; the odd-one-out tails; the hedged recall key; the salmon that had "never made the trip before". The reviewer answered the author's three questions as the page above shows.

What a student notices first is a pale green box and a pale orange box with a question over each, so the sort is visible before it is read. Four fixes before the cold read, all made: the eleven item cards handed over the sort (rows are now facts); a drawn card listed "riding a bike? no" inside the inherited box (dropped); the box tops sat unevenly on every sort card because one question wrapped to two lines (tops now level); the family cartoon's brief would not have shown the brown eyes at phone size (heads and shoulders fill the frame). The page pass found the item cards and Tina's table at 5-px type on a phone: the cards are stacked fact rows at 13-px type (15 px as rendered in a 360-px column) and the table is two stacked blocks. Minor: two cards two-thirds empty (sized from their content); "the eye sees first" lines added to five briefs; the unplaced parrot photo deleted (the robin-and-parrot pair card carries it). Still small at phone width and outside this pass: the side-by-side sort cards, kept side by side because the videos draw the parents' box left and the life box right.

50 items in content/G4T36_pp100_bank.py: 47 four-option MCQs, 2 typed words (trait) and one two-of-four select (the two things that shaped a pony's size). Per atom: LIF4-030 10 · LIF4-034 10 · LIF4-031 10 · LIF4-032 10 · LIF4-033 10. Easy 13, medium 22, hard 15, sorted easy to hard and rising with the atom's place in the topic. MCQ keys A 12 · B 12 · C 11 · D 12. The question forms, one exemplar each on the type sheet: where a trait came from, the evidence in the stem; which of four things in a scene is a trait; one living thing with four named traits, pick the one from life (or from the parents); which trait a named living thing could get from how it lived; which kind of trait or behavior this is, on the two fixed sets, five on drawn cards; type the word "trait"; a named child's claim is wrong, pick the correct reason; two ideas chained (the same parents, or the same care, rule out one cause); select the two things that played a part in a size. Every scene is fresh against the lessons, quizzes and practice (the scene-noun grep is in the build record), and the type sheet lists the draw constraints.

Skill: course-build → write-lesson → sentence-atomise, write-explanation, write-example-sequence, design-check-sequence, write-mcqs; write-video-script @ efd8fba

Grade 4 Topic 36 — Traits from parents, and traits from life — build record (v1, 2 October 2026)

What this is, in plain words

Five short lessons that teach a nine-year-old to ask two questions about anything a living thing has or does: was it there from the start, from the parents? Or did it come from how it lived? The first two lessons show each kind on its own (a puppy's floppy ears; Stella's scar from a bike fall). The third lesson sorts traits into two boxes on the board and only then gives the boxes their names, inherited and acquired. The fourth adds a third box for the traits both play a part in (height, size). The last lesson asks the same two questions about what an animal does — a spider's first web, a dog sitting on command — and coins instinct and learned behavior, saying in so many words that "born knowing" is the same idea as inherited and "picked up during life" the same as acquired. The topic never says "genes", "DNA" or "passed down".

Files: content/G4T36.py, content/G4T36_lessons.py, content/G4T36_pp100_bank.py, content/figures.py; records/TYPES_G4T36.md; blind/2026-10-02/ (bundle and sequestered keys); handoff/G4T36/videos/batch_G4T36.json + READY.md (built and checked, NOT sent).

Decisions made without a blueprint

• Lesson order and titles follow the register (030 → 034 → 031 → 032 → 033): L01 "Traits that came from the parents"; L02 "Traits that came from how it lived"; L03 "Sort a trait: inherited or acquired"; L04 "When both play a part"; L05 "A behavior it was born knowing, or one it learned". Reason: each kind gets its own lesson full of examples before the sort (the register's cross note on LIF4-030), and the names come last.
• "trait" is coined in L01 as the wider word: "Something a living thing has or can do … is called a trait." Reason: Grade 3 coined "feature" for a part of an animal's body (Topic 34); this topic needs a word that also covers a skill or a behavior, and TEKS 4.13B and the STAAR items say "trait".
• The role words are coined LAST, after the sort, and recalled by MCQ (James's brief): inherited trait / acquired trait at the end of L03; instinct / learned behavior at the end of L05; RECALL_BY_MCQ lists all four; "trait" is the one typed key. Reason: the brief's instruction, and "acquired" / "inherited" / "instinct" are not words a nine-year-old can be asked to spell.
• "came from the parents" / "came from how it lived" is the working frame everywhere; "passed down" and "passed on" never appear. Reason: the CLAUDE.md language rule (no figurative verb a young reader takes literally).
• L01 and L02 take the FACT form (examples only); L02 closes on one near miss (Stella's brown eyes) because it sits exactly at the line and sets up L03's sort. Reason: the Forces log's rule — a universal attribute takes a non-example only where one sits at the boundary.
• L03's sort card carries the deciding question on top of each box, in the lesson's words, and the boxes are the parents' box (left, green) and the life box (right, orange) everywhere in the topic. Reason: a verdict mark names its question; one depiction per thing.
• L03 carries the near miss a strong student needs — Sonia rides a bike and so does her dad, yet riding is acquired — with its sorting sentence ("A trait goes in the parents' box only if the living thing had it from the start"). Reason: the boundary rule from MS Chemistry Topic 13 — a verdict alone does not teach the line.
• L03 also says, in two lines, that an acquired trait stays with the one that got it (the running dog's puppies are born with ordinary legs). Reason: the Lamarck trap is the sub-domain's named misconception (register decisions); the sort's meaning needs it; it is two lines, not a rider lesson.
• L04 is a three-way sort (from the parents / from both / from how it lived) with a two-arrows card for a both trait; height and size are the only both cases. Reason: the register's example (a puppy's full-grown size) and the brief's card; no body-shaming — Sylvia is tall "like her mother and father", never compared with classmates.
• L05's "behavior" is a plain word, not a coin ("Something an animal does … is a behavior"). Reason: coin no word the everyday word covers; only instinct and learned behavior are the atom's terms.
• Every real living thing is a photo_ph, every scene with a person a cartoon_ph; code draws the sort cards, the three-bin card, the two-arrows cards, the pair cards, the item cards, the tables and the rule cards. Reason: James's 2 Oct ruling (code draws what must be exact; David's pack renders what must look real).
• Item figures are evidence cards (WHAT IT IS / THERE FROM THE START, LIKE ITS PARENTS? / SOMETHING IN ITS LIFE MADE IT?; the behavior card's two questions). Reason: the heritable-or-acquired rule needs the evidence on every item, and a card lets the cover test pass (cover the drawing and the item is unanswerable).
• All five lessons are "video and article". Reason: each carries an example sequence the video shows moving (a trait sliding into a box; a web spun the first time); none is a one-step fact a page could carry alone.

Questions for James (the build does not wait on them)

• Is "trait" the right word to coin on top of Grade 3's "feature", or should Grade 4 keep "feature" and use "trait" only as its name? Context: Grade 3 Topic 34 coined "feature" as something that is part of an animal's own body; TEKS and STAAR say "trait", and a skill or a behavior is not a body part. Recommendation and what I built: coin "trait" in L01 as the wider word, recall "feature" once in Grade 3's own sentence ("Offspring take after their parents: they share many features with them"); the typed "trait" items accept "feature" with a one-line steer.
• Should the four role words stay MCQ-only, or may "learned" (seven letters, spellable) be a typed key in the bank's hard tier? Context: the PP100 decision wants the hard tier typed; your brief for this topic says recall the role words by MCQ. Recommendation and what I built: MCQ-only for all four, "trait" the one typed key (two bank items, one practice item); flip "learned" to typed on your word.
• Does the dog's name stay unsaid? Context: the names rule allows only the row's four names; Sonia's dog is "Sonia's dog" in forty places. Recommendation and what I built: leave it unnamed; a dog's name would be a fifth name on the register.

Design-check-sequence records

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Skill: design-check-sequence @ efd8fba

Part: L01 (LIF4-030) — Type (a): one-step placing (where did this trait come from) on a fact true of every living thing.

Plan: 9 items — Grade 3 recall (3 opt) · which-is-a-trait (3 opt) · three where-from items with the evidence in the stem (2–3 opt) · Sylvia's claim, plants have no traits (yes/no) · predict the young (3 opt) · term recognition (3 opt) · typed recall of "trait" LAST.

Belongs in practice/bank instead: four-option forms; the pick-the-parents'-trait-of-three form.

Part: L02 (LIF4-034) — Type (a): one-step placing with a life event as the evidence.

Plan: 9 items — six where-from items across an injury, two skills, a worked animal, a tree, a trimmed tree (2 opt) · Grade 3 recall LIF3-042 (3 opt) · Sonia's claim, every trait from the parents (yes/no) · the near miss (a chin dimple, 2 opt). Two-option string B A A B A B A A B.

Belongs elsewhere: which-trait-could-come-from-life (bank form D).

Part: L03 (LIF4-031) — Type (a): a fluency sort on the fixed set "an inherited trait / an acquired trait", every stem carrying its evidence.

Plan: 11 items — six sorts (two on drawn cards J, K) · the near miss (Sylvia swims and so does her mother) · Stella's claim, a scarred dog's puppies born with the scar (yes/no) · two term recognition items LAST (RECALL_BY_MCQ, no typed item). Fixed-set string I A I I I A A A, then the claim keyed no.

Belongs elsewhere: four-option SORT4; claim-by-reason.

Part: L04 (LIF4-032) — Type (a): a three-way fluency sort "from the parents / from how it lived / from both", evidence in every stem.

Plan: 11 items — eight sorts (one on card L) · Stella's claim, height from the parents only (yes/no) · Sonia's claim, a plant's height from water and light only (yes/no) · one FRQ transfer (big tomatoes). Three-option string 2 0 1 2 2 0 1 2.

Belongs elsewhere: the multi-select; the same-parents / same-care reason items.

Part: L05 (LIF4-033, capstone) — Type (a): a fluency sort "an instinct / a learned behavior", evidence in every stem (first time with nobody showing it; taught or copied).

Plan: 12 items — six sorts (one on card M) · Sonia's claim, trained dog's puppies born knowing sit (yes/no) · Sylvia's claim, animals learn every behavior (yes/no) · the link item (born knowing = which kind of trait, 2 opt) · two term items LAST. Fixed-set string I L L I I L I.

Belongs elsewhere: BEH4; claim-by-reason; the young-on-the-day-they-are-born form.

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The key strings

• L01: two-option B B; three-option 0 2 1 0 1 2 (and one typed). L02: two-option B A A B A B A A B; the recall 1. L03: two-option A B A A A B B B B (position B 5 of 9 = 56 %); three-option 1 0. L04: two-option B B; three-option 2 0 1 2 2 0 1 2. L05: two-option A B B A A B A B B B (B 6 of 10 = 60 %); three-option 2 0.
• Attached questions in video order (L01–L05, then the summary's three): B A A C B A B A (A 4 of 8).
• Bank MCQ keys: A 12 · B 12 · C 11 · D 12; bank key string (T = typed, M = multi): D D A C D D C C D A B D A D D A C B A B A B B D B C C C C C A B A B C T T D C B M D A A D A B A B B. No key is its item's longest option outside the two fixed sets (checked by script; the fixed sets are whitelisted by name).
• Fixed sets: SORT4 "an inherited trait / an acquired trait / both inherited and acquired / not a trait"; BEH4 "an instinct / a learned behavior / both an instinct and a learned behavior / not a behavior".

The example sequences, written out

• L01 (fact form, one frame): "<It> was born with <trait>. Its parents have <trait> too. So <trait> came from the parents." E the puppies' floppy ears (animal, body) → coin "trait" → E Stella's brown eyes (a person, the cartoon family) → E the sunflower's yellow petals (a plant: "A plant has traits too") → rule → closing return.
• L02 (fact form with one boundary case): "<It> was not born with <trait>. <Event> happened. So <trait> came from how it lived." E Stella's scar (an injury) → E Sonia riding a bike (a skill) → E the dog's strong legs from running (an animal) → E the pine bent by the wind (a plant; Grade 3's surroundings sentence quoted) → NE Stella's brown eyes → rule → closing return.
• L03 (classification, two frames on one card): "<Trait> was there from the start, and the parents have it too. So it goes in the parents' box." / "<Trait> was not there from the start; <event> made it. So it goes in the life box." Floppy ears (P) → fetching (L) → a brown coat (P) → strong legs from running (L) → the near miss, riding a bike (L, with its sorting sentence) → the young (an acquired trait stays with the one that got it) → the names → rule → closing return.
• L04 (three-way): Sylvia's brown eyes (P) → Sylvia's reading (L) → Sylvia's height (BOTH, the two-arrows card) → the dog's brown coat (P, on the filled card) → the big dog's size (BOTH, the second two-arrows card) → the sunflower's height (BOTH) → rule → closing return.
• L05 (classification in pairs): "<Animal> did <behavior> the first time, with nobody to show it. It was born knowing how." / "<Animal> did not do <behavior> on its own; <someone taught it / it copied others>. It learned it." Spider's web (I) → dog sits (L) → robin chick's open beak (I) → parrot's hello (L) → turtle hatchlings to the sea (I) → dog begs at the table (L) → the link → the young → the names → rule → closing return.

The rules applied

Misconceptions confronted, by name

The vault catalogue (Elementary physics misconceptions catalogue (grades 3-5).md) is silent on heredity; the rows below come from the vault's own biology research (Phase 3.2 - Biology Misconception Identification.md, M1.2 Lamarckian inheritance and M3.4 acquired changes inherited; the Franklin LS 3.8 rejection) and the literature named.

Checker result, every WARN answered

python3 build_tools_check_topic.py grade4/topic36_build/content/G4T36.py → 0 FAIL, 55 WARN. python3 grade4/check_g4_articles.py … → 0 FAIL (articles 248 / 299 / 344 / 292 / 346 words; scripts 145 / 148 / 148 / 149 / 149; intro 112; summary 152, opener ok).

• S36 (51 words), answered: fine, the lesson's own concrete nouns, met with their thing on the page: scar ×42, floppy ×29, foal ×22 (a horse's young: said with "horse" every time), skill ×15, command ×13 ("on command" beside "when Sonia says sit"), petals ×12, fetching / fetch ×9, dimple ×7, tuft ×7 (said with "of fur"), notch ×6, juggling / juggle ×9, perfect ×6, fawn / fawns ×7 (said with "deer"), piglet ×3, hooves ×3, bushy ×3, bald ×3, pouch ×2, pounces / pounced / pouncing ×5, fluffs / fluffing / fluffed ×4, spray / spraying ×4, spun ×2, hutch ×2, shampoo ×2, trail ×1, packet ×1, ordinary ×1, trash ×1 ("trash cans"), stony ×1, tying ×1, event ×2 (in two bank whys: "an event made it" — kept, the sentence before names the event), tricky ×2 (a subtitle, "A tricky one"), skills ×1. US animals a child knows, kept: beaver ×4, salmon ×4, minnow ×2, monarch ×1 ("monarch butterfly"), guinea ×1 ("guinea pig"), llama ×1, marigold ×1, aquarium ×1, rink ×4 ("ice rink"). Grade 3's own word: surrounding ×3 (an option, "a surrounding", the sister of "offspring" and "trait" — Grade 3 Topic 40's term). Swapped during the build: wattle → "a fan of tail feathers"; scoop → "the feed bag shakes"; tendrils → "curly climbing stems"; latch → "the hook on its gate"; unevenly → "given some plants more".
• S13 L01-q7 ("bright green" in the stem): kept. The item asks the student to predict the young's skin from the parents', so the parents' color must be stated; the key is the inference (the young take after the parents), and the distractors (brown, blue) are the colors a child picks who thinks the young come out different. The same shape as Grade 3 Topic 40 L03's brown cows.
• S29 "run verb on a non-runner" ×2 (L03 headache and article: "strong legs from running"): kept. The runner is the dog, which runs.
• S8 two beats of three sentences (L03 and L05 openers): kept. Each opener names the scene, the people and the question in three short sentences (the Grade 4 demo's "every lesson video opens by re-establishing its scene"); every other beat is one or two sentences.
• check_g4_articles WARN, L03 344 and L05 346 words above 300: kept, with a subtitle or figure every ≤ 8 idea lines (L03's longest run is 8, the sort run itself; L05's is 5). L03 carries the four-trait sort, the near miss, the two lines on the young and the coin; L05 carries three pairs, the link and the coin. Each stands alone against the script's 148–149 words.
• check_brief: every lesson and the summary clean; the INTRO's one hit is the standing accepted one (an intro has no rule slide, so no closing bullets; James, 25 Sep 2026). grep -ci strand batch_G4T36.json → 0. The batch is built and checked, NOT sent (no word of James's for this topic's videos). No banned word was needed by any script (the tool's list: force, gravity, sweep, velocity, acceleration, lift, leak, energy, momentum …; none appears).

Bank freshness, re-performed

Scene nouns of every lesson, quiz, attached and practice item (the list the bank was grepped against): puppy / puppies, floppy, sunflower, scar, bike, knee, trail, pine, board, boxes, fetch, Sylvia's height, big dog / small dog, shed, spider, web, robin, parrot, turtle, begs; spotted horse, rabbit, hutch, lamb, pumpkin, curly hair, frog, duck, gray cat, kitten, notch, skate, rink, cart, maple, wall, pepper, dimple, piano, park, chipped tooth, white paws, tuft, cupboard, horn buds, foal, star, whistle, swim, thorn, fox cub, jump, corn, blue eyes, juggle, calf, feed bucket, dolphin, hoop, beaver, dam, moth, porch, crow, nuts, kangaroo, chick pecks; goose / gosling, oak, acorn, zebra, sailor, rope, woodpecker, mouse, short parents, seal, salmon, hummingbird, goldfish, owl, hot pan, string.

Word-bounded grep of the bank (stems, options, whys) after the re-scening pass: puppy 0, puppies 0, sunflower 0, scar 0, pumpkin 0, frog 0, duck 0, kitten 0, foal 0, whistle 0, goose 0, gosling 0, oak 0, acorn 0, dog 0. Residual whole-word hits that are a different use, kept: "thorns" (a rose bush's trait, PP-5, against L03's thorn-scarred dog); "calf" once (a bull "as a calf", PP-22, against L04's attached calf); "short" (a "short kind" of plant, against the practice's "short parents"); "corn" (the rooster's feed, against L04's tall corn). Re-scened in this pass: the sheepdog's puppies → a sheep's lamb (PP-40); the guide dog's puppies → a campground bear's cubs (PP-50); the llama's scar and whistle → a bent ear tip and two claps (PP-15); the giant pumpkin → a giant watermelon (PP-27); the bullfrog → a catfish (PP-36); the duckling → a minnow (PP-48); the kittens → piglets (PP-42); the sunflower kinds → marigolds (PP-45); the goslings → fawns (PP-44); card S's oak → an apple tree; the circus pony's foal → "its young" (PP-46). Draw constraints are listed in the type sheet.

Blind-text grep

python3 build_tools_blind_bundle.py … → bundled 119 mcq, 4 text, 1 frq, 1 multi (125 held). grep "[Drawing:" | grep -iE "born|learned|instinct|inherited|acquired" → 1 hit, explained: card M's WHAT IT DOES row reads "a newborn foal stands and walks within an hour" — "newborn" is the evidence the stem relies on (did it the first time), not the verdict word; the card never says instinct or learned. grep -i "parents" → 7 hits, all the card's row label "THERE FROM THE START, LIKE ITS PARENTS?" and its evidence cells ("both parents have white coats"; "its parents are big horses") — the evidence rows the heritable-or-acquired rule requires, never the deciding word (inherited / acquired / both). No alt text or caption on an item figure names a verdict.

Figures (author self-check on the renders; the non-author review-figures pass is owed)

All 44 SVGs rendered through headless Chrome to six contact sheets (/tmp/g4t36_sheet0–5.png) and opened; the five article routes, the L03 quiz route and the PP100 route screenshotted at 900 px (/tmp/g4t36_L0N_article.png, /tmp/g4t36_L03_quiz.png, /tmp/g4t36_pp100.png) and read. Every box's question sits above its box and wraps inside its width; the chips FROM THE PARENTS / FROM HOW IT LIVED / FROM BOTH / INHERITED TRAIT / ACQUIRED TRAIT / INSTINCT / LEARNED BEHAVIOR sit inside their boxes; the two-arrows cards' arrowheads land on the lower box; the pair cards' verdict lines are bold and inside; the item cards' cells fit their columns (the drawer's guard asserts it); the tables' columns are sized from measured text; rule cards hold three or four lines inside the card; placeholders render as the pale box with grey "photo: …" / "cartoon: …" text. Nothing mislabelled, nothing out of frame, no fix needed on the render. check_svg_ids.py → PASS (0 ids). One depiction per thing: the parents' box left and green, the life box right and orange, the both box middle and yellow, in every card; born-knowing left on every pair card. Item figures: q_card_j/k/l/m, pr_card_n/p, pp_card_q/r/s/t/v — letters J–V, outside the option alphabet A–D; each carries blind= data that lists the rows.

Names run

python3 build_tools_names.py Yamamoto Sonia Stella Sylvia → Yamamoto free · Sonia free · Stella free · Sylvia free · exit 0. Claim-makers: Sylvia (L01-q5, L05-q9, PP-38, PP-47), Sonia (L02-q6, L04-q10, L05-q8, PP-39, PP-43), Stella (L03-q9, L04-q9, PP-42, PP-46). No other person is named; no animal is named.

Sentence-atomise self-check (one table per paragraph, collapsed to the rows that changed)

Every idea line now carries one idea, a named actor (the puppies, Stella, the spider, the dog — never a bare "it" opening a line), the verb carrying the cause ("the fence caught", "the wind bent", "Sonia taught"), and the plain word before every term. Every question in an article is answered in the next sentence, verdict first ("Does riding a bike go in the parents' box …?" / "No, it goes in the life box, because …").

Judgement calls

• "from the start" rather than "at birth" in the deciding question and the rule, because a plant is not born: the article says "the yellow came with the seed" for the sunflower. The brief's card wording ("Was it there at birth, from the parents?") is kept in meaning; the drawn card says "from the start". James may prefer "at birth" — a one-word change in figures.py (Q_PARENTS) and the lexicon.
• Grade 3's "feature" and "surroundings" are recalled but not listed in TOPIC["terms"], so that S34 does not demand recognition and recall items for words this topic does not coin; each is recalled by one Grade 3 sentence and one practice recall item.
• The two typed items sit under LIF4-030 in the hard tier, so the bank's difficulty-by-atom rises except for these two (the same shape Topic 22 took with its crust term item); the hard tier otherwise belongs to 031, 032 and 033.
• One multi-select (the two things that shaped a pony's size) — the answer is genuinely a set; the record counts it (1 of 50).
• The L05 claim item sits on the taught dog (Sonia's dog's puppies) — the claim item may sit on the taught case (design-check-sequence type (c) ruling); every other L05 item is a fresh animal.
• Real-organism claims checked: a newborn foal stands within an hour (yes); sea turtle hatchlings crawl to the sea unaided (yes); a beaver raised without seeing a dam builds one (yes, the classic captive-beaver observation); monarchs migrate without having made the trip (yes, each fall generation is new); city crows dropping nuts for cars is observed and spread by copying (Sendai, Japan, and US cities — reported); a baby alligator hunts within a day of hatching (yes, hatchlings feed on insects and small fish at once); a parrot copies "hello" (yes). Flamingos, bison humps and freckles were avoided as examples whose science is not clean at this grade.
• Violence kept gentle: injuries are a scar from a fall, a notched or torn ear, a bent horn, a chipped tooth, a lost tail tip; no blood, no death, no hurt child.

Owed

• Blind review: the bundle is cut (blind/2026-10-02/); two cold readers and the adjudication are owed before the keys count as verified.
• The non-author review-figures, review-questions and review-accuracy passes.
• The picture pass through David's pack (16 briefs in IMAGE_BRIEFS) — waits for James's word on the three questions above, per the 2 Oct sequencing rule.
• The video batch is built and checked but NOT sent; James's review of the scripts is the cue.
• Nothing committed.

v2 — reviews applied (2 October 2026)

Skill: course-build → write-lesson (lesson lines) · write-video-script (the L03 and L05 beats, the summary line) · write-mcqs (every item change; check_key_tells.py) · write-explanation (fb and why lines) · review-figures (author re-render after the drawer changes) @ e23b67f

In plain words. The three reviews (blind read, guidance/questions/accuracy, figures) were applied in place the same day. The two Essentials: the "life" option no longer wears a colon tail that marked it as the key, and the rule the topic's named misconception hangs on — an acquired trait stays with the one that got it — is now spoken in the L03 and L05 videos and in the summary, not only written in the articles. Stella became Tina (three two-syllable S-names read as one person). The eleven item cards no longer print the sorting questions already answered: they carry plain facts (when the trait was first seen, what the parents have, what happened to the living thing) and the student does the sort. Every key keeps its letter and meaning except the two claims rewritten TRUE (L01-q5, L04-q10: no → yes). The lexicon is unchanged, so Topic 38's word-for-word recap of the inherited-trait line still matches.

Finding → change

Checker lines

• python3 build_tools_check_topic.py grade4/topic36_build/content/G4T36.py → 0 FAIL, 54 WARN. New since v1 and answered: S8 ×3 (L03's opener and tricky beat, L05's opener carry three short sentences each — the scene re-set, as v1 answered; the tricky beat gained its third sentence from the trim "Sonia and her dad both ride bikes."); S36 list unchanged in kind (scar, floppy, foal, skill, petals, command … all met with their thing on the page; "surrounding ×3" gone — the options now say "its surroundings"); S13 L01-q7 "bright green" kept as v1; S29 ×2 the running dog, kept.
• python3 grade4/check_g4_articles.py … → 0 FAIL: articles 297 / 299 / 344 / 293 / 346 (L03 and L05 above 300 as v1 answered; L01 now 297 with the two added pairs of lines); scripts 145 / 148 / 150 / 149 / 150; intro 112; summary 162, opener ok.
• python3 ~/Documents/CourseBuilding-Vault/skills/write-mcqs/check_key_tells.py grade4/topic36_build/content/G4T36.py → KEY TELLS: 0 of 120 MCQs flagged (a: 0, b: 0, c: 0) (was 12 of 120).
• python3 build_tools_names.py Yamamoto Sonia Tina Sylvia → Yamamoto free · Sonia free · Tina free · Sylvia free · exit 0. Candidate names grepped word-bounded across grade4/ grade3/ demos/ reviews/: Tina 0 hits (Ruby 20, Hana 16, Nora 45, Tess 31, Jade 15, Faye 6 … all taken).
• check_svg_ids.py → PASS (43 figures, 0 ids).
• python3 build_tools_video_batch.py … → 7 videos, key string B A A C B A B A (A 4 of 8); check_brief.py → L01–L05 and SUMMARY ✓, INTRO the standing R79 line only; grep -ci strand 0; grep -c Stella 0. Not sent.
• Blind bundle re-cut: grade4/topic36_build/blind/2026-10-02-v2/ (BLIND_BUNDLE_G4T36.md, KEYS_SEQUESTERED_G4T36.json): 119 mcq, 4 text, 1 frq, 1 multi, held 125; 11 [Drawing: lines; grep -iwE "born|learned|instinct|inherited|acquired|yes|no|partly" → 0 (the only substring hits are "nobody" in three WHO SHOWED IT rows).

Key strings (after v2)

• L01 two-option B B A (vq, q3, q5); three-option 0 2 1 0 1 2. L02 unchanged B A A B A B A A B. L03 unchanged A B A A A B B B B. L04 two-option B A (q9, q10); three-option 2 0 1 2 2 0 1 2. L05 unchanged. Claims across the topic: L01-05 yes · L02-06 no · L03-09 no · L04-09 no · L04-10 yes · L05-08 no · L05-09 no.
• Attached questions B A A C B A B A. Bank MCQ keys A 12 · B 12 · C 11 · D 12, unchanged (no key letter moved).

Changed ids

Lessons: L01 article (+4 idea lines), L01-q5, L01-q8; L02 article a17 + caption, L02 script beat 4, L02-vq1, L02-q1, q2, q3, q4, q5, q8, q9; L03 script (beats 1–6), L03-q5 fb/why, L03-q8 fb/why, L03-q9 (Tina), L03-q10, L03-q11; L04-q8 fb/why, L04-q9 (Tina), L04-q10; L05 script (beats 1, 5, 6), L05-q7 fb/why. Practice: PR-2, PR-3, PR-5, PR-7, PR-9, PR-10, PR-12. Bank: PP-9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 17, 18, 21, 22, 28, 33, 34 (whys), 38, 42 (Tina), 46, 47. Summary beat 4. Figures: _bin, sort_card, three_bins, sort_card_terms, _card + the eleven cards, table_tina (was table_stella), dog_running_photo, five briefs, parrot_photo removed.

Figures opened (renders, not source)

Per-key PNGs through headless Chrome at natural size and in a 360-px column (/tmp/g4t36_v2_figs/): all eleven cards on one sheet, the three sort cards, the two three-bin cards, table_tina, pair_terms. Built page /tmp/g4t36_v2.html: the five article routes, the L03 quiz route and the PP100 route screenshotted at 1000 px and inside a true 360-px iframe (/tmp/g4t36_v2_frame_*.png; a bare --window-size=360 is widened by Chrome's minimum window and clips the right edge, so the iframe is the honest phone test). Measured on the render by the card's dark border (the page background shares the label band's grey, so a fill scan lies): in the 360-px column the card's rect spans 299 px → the SVG shows at 345 px → the 13-px type reads at 15.0 px, asked cell included; on the desktop column the card displays at 361 px (disp=360 on _card: 15.6-px type) instead of stretching to the 880-px column. Every card: four (or three) fact rows, no yes / no / partly, level tops, nothing clipped. Still small at phone width, outside this pass: the side-by-side sort and three-bin teaching cards (560 units → about 7-px type at 360 px); kept side by side because the videos draw the parents' box left and the life box right, and a stacked variant would be a second depiction — the coordinator may want a phone-stacked twin registered.

Judgement calls in this pass

• The summary's stays-with sentence sits in the names beat, not beat 3 as the review wrote, so "acquired trait" is spoken only after it is coined. Topic 38's recap is untouched (the lexicon did not change).
• L05's beat uses the dog-specific line (parallel to L03's) rather than the general "A behavior picked up during life stays with the animal that picked it up": the general sentence stays in the article; the 150-word cap would not take both.
• PR-2 keeps Grade 3's idea but not its "but" (a joiner on the key alone is a tell the checker fails); the Grade 3 sentence is quoted in every fb.
• parrot_photo deleted rather than placed (above).
• The cards' FIRST SEEN row says "on its first day" rather than "the day it was born", so no drawing line carries "born".

Owed after v2

Two cold readers on the v2 bundle (keys unverified until they agree); the picture pass (15 briefs) after James's word on the three v1 questions; the batch waits for James's review of the scripts. Nothing committed.

v3 — polish (2 October 2026)

Skill: write-mcqs (the four item changes; check_key_tells.py) · write-like-james (the Needs-you page, records/REVIEW_NEXT_G4T36.md) @ e23b67f

In plain words. Reader C re-read the whole v2 bundle (126 rows after this pass; 125 before) and agreed every key. Four small things were asked for and all four are done: PP-13 no longer offers the bricks' weight beside "from how he lived" (they were the same answer twice); PP-39's key is one clause and no longer the longest option; the first four L03 items no longer alternate their keys; and a third TRUE claim (a firefly's first flashes) joins the seven "Is X right?" items, so a child who always says "no" now scores five of eight, not five of seven. Sonia became Paula (Sonia and Sylvia shared a first letter and an ending). Every key keeps its letter and its meaning; the lexicon is unchanged.

Finding → change

Changed ids

Lessons: L03 quiz order (q2 ↔ q3); L05-q10 new, former q10–q12 now q11–q13; the rename touches L01 headache / article / script, L02 article a17 / script beat 4 / q6, L03 headache / article / script, L04-q10, L05 headache / article / script / q8. Bank: PP-13 (option C), PP-39 (options B, C), PP-39 and PP-43 (Paula). Figures: sort_card_dog alt, pair_spider_dog rows and alt, bike_cartoon, dog_running_photo, board_cartoon, shed_cartoon, begging_cartoon and their five briefs (the name only). Records: TYPES_G4T36.md (v3 line, Paula), grade4/NAMES_POOL.md row 36.

Key strings (after v3)

• L03 two-option A A B A A B B B B; three-option 1 0. L05 two-option A B B A A B A B B A B (A 5 of 11); three-option 2 0. L01, L02, L04 unchanged. Claims: L01-05 yes · L02-06 no · L03-09 no · L04-09 no · L04-10 yes · L05-08 no · L05-09 no · L05-10 yes.
• Attached questions B A A C B A B A (unchanged). Bank MCQ keys A 12 · B 12 · C 11 · D 12 (unchanged).

The gates

• python3 build_tools_check_topic.py grade4/topic36_build/content/G4T36.py → 0 FAIL, 52 WARN (the v2 list less two S36 words; every WARN answered in v1 and v2; the firefly item added no WARN).
• python3 grade4/check_g4_articles.py … → 0 FAIL: articles 297 / 299 / 344 / 293 / 346; scripts 145 / 148 / 150 / 149 / 150; intro 112; summary 162, opener ok.
• python3 ~/Documents/CourseBuilding-Vault/skills/write-mcqs/check_key_tells.py … → KEY TELLS: 0 of 121 MCQs flagged (a: 0, b: 0, c: 0).
• python3 build_tools_names.py Yamamoto Paula Tina Sylvia → all free, exit 0.
• python3 build_tools_build_topic_site.py … /tmp/g4t36_p.html → 5 lessons, 15 practice, 50 pp100, 43 figures. check_svg_ids.py → PASS (43 figures, 0 ids).
• python3 build_tools_video_batch.py … → 7 videos, key string B A A C B A B A; check_brief.py → L01–L05 and SUMMARY ✓, INTRO the standing R79 line only; grep -c Sonia 0, grep -c Paula 4, grep -ci strand 0. Not sent.
• Blind bundle re-cut: grade4/topic36_build/blind/2026-10-02-v3/ — 120 mcq, 4 text, 1 frq, 1 multi, held 126; [Drawing: lines grepped for born / learned / instinct / inherited / acquired / yes / no / partly → 0.

Owed after v3

Two cold readers on the v3 bundle only if James wants a fourth read (the four changes are small and Reader C's keys stand); the picture pass (15 briefs) after James's word on the Needs-you page; the batch waits for his review of the scripts. Nothing committed.

Skill: course-build → write-mcqs → write-explanation, design-check-sequence @ efd8fba · v2 fix pass (the 2 Oct reviews) @ e23b67f · v3 polish (Reader C's re-read) @ e23b67f

Topic 36 — Traits from parents, and traits from life — the PP100's question types, with their exemplars (v2, 2 October 2026)

v3 (polish, the same evening, after Reader C's full re-read): PP-13's third option is now "from the hot sun on the building site" (the bricks' weight was the key said again); PP-39's key is one clause, "He learned to ride, so it is an acquired trait.", and its long distractor carries the same joiner and is longer; the claim-maker Sonia is now Paula (PP-39, PP-43); keys, tags, atoms and the ten forms are unchanged; check_key_tells.py → KEY TELLS: 0 of 121 MCQs flagged.

v2 (the three reviews applied, same day): the claim-maker Stella is now Tina; every where-from option is in the lexicon's frame with no tail ("from how it lived" / "from its parents", the two scene distractors kept and shortened — PP-9 to PP-13); the three by-reason keys are one clause ("An acquired trait stays with the one that got it." PP-38; "A learned behavior stays with the animal that learned it." PP-46; "Hunting is an instinct it was born knowing." PP-47); PP-17 and PP-18 offer four bare traits of one shape; the five card items (PP-21, 22, 28, 33, 34) read FACT rows — THE TRAIT / FIRST SEEN / ITS PARENTS / WHAT HAPPENED TO IT, or WHAT IT DOES / THE FIRST TIME / WHO SHOWED IT — never yes / no / partly; check_key_tells.py → KEY TELLS: 0 of 120 MCQs flagged. Keys, tags, atoms and the ten forms are unchanged.

In one line: 50 items, 47 four-option MCQs, 1 multi-select, 2 typed ("trait"); ten forms; the role words (inherited trait, acquired trait, instinct, learned behavior) are recalled by MCQ among their sisters, never typed (James's brief for this topic); MCQ keys A 12 · B 12 · C 11 · D 12; no key is its item's longest option outside the two fixed sets.

What this page is. James reads a bank as its question TYPES first (vault: A bank is reviewed as its question types first, one exemplar each). Under the Grade 4 standing brief the bank is built straight away (50 items in content/G4T36_pp100_bank.py); this sheet is the way in. Each type line says what the stem asks, what the four options (or the accept list) are, and prints one exemplar in full. The bank file's type_ numbers (1–20) are finer than the ten forms here; the mapping is in the table. Tags follow depth of reasoning — easy = one fact or a one-step sort with the evidence given; medium = the rule applied to a fresh case, one of four named traits picked, a drawn card read; hard = a claim judged by its correct reason, two ideas chained, a set answer, or a term produced — and rise with the atom's order: LIF4-030 (traits from the parents) carries easy items and two hard typed term items; LIF4-034 (traits from life) easy and medium; LIF4-031 (the sort) medium and hard; LIF4-032 (both) medium and hard; LIF4-033 (instinct or learned) medium and hard. Every hard item carries a one-line "hard because" (hb) in the bank file.

Rulings already applied. Every heritable-or-acquired stem carries its evidence (born with it and the parents have it; or the event in its life — training, an injury, food, where it grew) — vault A heritable-or-acquired check carries its evidence in the stem; a stem that only describes two individuals that differ never appears. Four options on every MCQ; two fixed sets, copied word for word from the lessons' box names: SORT4 = "an inherited trait / an acquired trait / both inherited and acquired / not a trait" (every option is a real key somewhere: "both" keys the LIF4-032 items; "not a trait" is a live distractor against the trait definition) and BEH4 = "an instinct / a learned behavior / both an instinct and a learned behavior / not a behavior". No option bundles a verdict with its reason (every claim is "X is wrong … What is the correct reason?" with four single-statement reasons). Every stem is a positive question of at most two sentences unless tagged hard (S23). An item card (Trait J … Behavior V) carries only FACT rows — THE TRAIT / FIRST SEEN / ITS PARENTS / WHAT HAPPENED TO IT (a behavior card: WHAT IT DOES / THE FIRST TIME / WHO SHOWED IT) — never the deciding word and never yes / no / partly (v2: the v1 rows printed the sorting questions already answered), and its blind text lists the rows as data. US spelling; units as words.

The bar list (real things a generated item must never use): "genes", "DNA", "heredity", "characteristic", "passed down / passed on" (a parcel a young reader takes literally — say "came from the parents"); "predator / prey"; any claim that an injury, a scar or a learned trick is inherited as a KEY; no body-shaming trait (weight, "ugly", "fat", "weak"); no human height item that compares children against each other (height only as "from both"); no real organism whose genetics the item does not know (a trait pair that is really two populations of one animal); any lesson scene (floppy-eared puppies and their brown coats; Tina's brown eyes and her scar; the sunflower; Paula's bike; Paula's running dog; the wind-bent pine; the board with two boxes; the dog fetching; Sylvia's height; the big dog and the small dog; the shed spider; the dog sitting on command; the robin chick; the parrot; the sea turtles; the begging dog); any quiz, attached or practice scene (the spotted horse, rabbit, lamb, pumpkin plant, curly hair, green frogs, duck, gray kittens, notched cat, skater, cart horse, maple by a wall, pepper plants, chin dimple, piano, trimmed park tree, chipped tooth, white-pawed kitten, rabbit's tuft, cupboard cat, horn buds, star-marked foal, whistling boy, Sylvia's swimming, thorn-scarred dog, big puppy, fox cub, jumping horse, tall corn, small lamb, blue-eyed boy, juggling, big calf, feed-bucket horse, dolphin, beaver, moth, city crow, kangaroo, pecking chick; the practice's geese, kittens in a litter, oak seedlings, zebra, sailor, woodpecker, mouse card, short parents, seal card, salmon, hummingbird, goldfish; the summary's owl chick, hot-pan scar, pouncing kitten); a claim-maker from another topic's row (only Paula, Tina and Sylvia); "biggest / smallest" for anything but size.

The ten forms (bank type_ numbers in brackets)

Hard because — F: the word is produced, not picked. G: each claim is judged by its correct reason, which needs the lesson's rule held against the belief, and every distractor half-accepts the belief, so the key is not the odd one out. H: two steps (rule out one cause, then name the other; sort the behavior, then say what the young have from the start). I: a set, with two distractors that are things around the animal. E's link items: the behavior is sorted first, then matched to the kind of trait that is the same idea.

One exemplar per form, in full

A (easy, LIF4-034). An otter has a torn ear from a fight with another otter last spring. Where did the torn ear come from? — from its parents / from the cold river water / from the fish it eats / from how it lived. Why: Some traits come from how a living thing lived: something that happened during its life made them. The otter's ear was whole until the fight last spring. So the torn ear came from how it lived. (nearest lesson-side instance: L02-q1, the cat's notched ear, two options — here four, and the animal, the event and the season are new)

B (easy, LIF4-030). Which of these is a trait of a chipmunk? — the log it hides under / the acorns it stores / its stripes / the forest it lives in. Why: Something a living thing has or can do is called a trait. The stripes are part of the chipmunk itself; the log, the acorns and the forest are around it. So the stripes are a trait. (nearest: L01-q2, the rabbit's long ears against its hutch and carrots, three options)

C (medium, LIF4-034). A llama was born with brown wool like its mother, comes to the barn when the farmer claps twice because the farmer taught it, and has a bent ear tip from a fence wire. Which of these came from how it lived? — the brown wool / the brown wool and the bent ear tip from the wire / none of these / coming to the claps and the bent ear tip. Why: A trait that came from how a living thing lived was not there from the start. The brown wool was there at birth, like its mother's; the claps were taught, and the fence wire bent the ear tip. So the claps and the bent ear tip came from how it lived. (nearest: none on the lesson side — the quizzes ask one trait at a time; the form is new to the bank)

D (medium, LIF4-034). Which of these is a trait a black bear could get from how it lived? — black fur / a torn ear / a short tail / five claws on each paw. Why: A trait from how a living thing lived was not there from the start; an event made it. The fur, the tail and the claws were there at birth; the fight tore the ear later. So the torn ear came from how it lived. (nearest: L02's rule; no quiz item asks it this way round)

E (medium, LIF4-031, drawn card). Here is a trait card for a bull. Which kind of trait is Trait R? [card: THE TRAIT a bull's bent horn; FIRST SEEN when it was one year old; ITS PARENTS both have straight horns; WHAT HAPPENED TO IT it caught the horn on a gate as a calf] — an inherited trait / an acquired trait / both inherited and acquired / not a trait. Why: A trait that came from how a living thing lived is called an acquired trait. The card says the bent horn was first seen when the bull was one year old, after it caught the horn on a gate as a calf, and both parents have straight horns. So Trait R is an acquired trait. (nearest: L03-q8, Trait K the cupboard cat, two options — here the four-option set and a new animal and event)

F (hard, LIF4-030, typed). A catfish has long whiskers, smooth skin and a flat wide head. Type the word for something a living thing has, like each of these. — accept: trait, traits, a trait, the trait, its trait, its traits, trate, trates, trayt, trat, triat, trait. Why: Something a living thing has or can do is called a trait. Whiskers, smooth skin and a flat head are things the catfish has. So the word is trait. (nearest: L01-q9, the duck's webbed feet; a fresh animal and three fresh features)

G (hard, LIF4-033). A circus pony learned to bow on command. Tina says its young will be born knowing how to bow on command. Tina is wrong. What is the correct reason? — A learned behavior stays with the animal that learned it. / Ponies cannot learn to bow. / The young pony is born knowing how to bow only if both its parents were taught it. / A young pony is born knowing every behavior its mother has. Why: The pony was taught to bow during its life, so bowing on command is a learned behavior. A learned behavior stays with the animal that learned it. So the young pony is born without it, and Tina is wrong. (nearest: L05-q8, Paula's claim about her dog's puppies, bare yes / no — here the reason is the target and the animal and trick are new)

H (hard, LIF4-032). Two fawns from the same mother and father are raised apart. One gets plenty of leaves and grass and grows into a big deer; the other gets little food and grows into a small deer. What is the correct reason they differ in size? — Size comes partly from the food a living thing got while it grew, and they got different food. / They had different parents. / Size never comes from the parents at all, so the only thing that can matter is the food each fawn eats. / One fawn learned to be big. Why: The fawns had the same parents, so the parents' part of their size is the same. Size comes from both the parents and the food a living thing got while it grew. So the one that got plenty of food grew bigger. (nearest: L04's both rule; no quiz item holds one cause fixed to isolate the other)

I (hard, LIF4-032, multi-select). A pony grew into a big, strong pony. Select the two things that played a part in its size. — its parents' size / the color of its halter / the hay and oats it got while it grew / the name the farmer gave it. Why: A living thing's size comes from its parents and from the food it got while it grew. The halter's color and the pony's name are things around it, not things that shaped it. So its parents' size and its hay and oats played a part. (nearest: L04-q1, the big puppy, three options with "from both" — here the set itself is picked)

Draw constraints (⟂: never in one twenty-item draw)

• PP-38 (lizard's tail, reason: "an acquired trait stays with the one that got it") ⟂ PP-40 (sheep's lamb) ⟂ PP-50 (bear's cubs) ⟂ PP-46 (circus pony): each states the stays-with-the-one rule that answers the others.
• PP-42 (piglets, same parents) ⟂ PP-44 (fawns, same parents): one move, two scene kinds; drawn one per test.
• PP-43 (bean seedlings, same care) ⟂ PP-45 (marigolds, same care): the same.
• PP-26 (giraffe) ⟂ PP-27 (watermelon) ⟂ PP-28 (card S, apple tree): "both inherited and acquired" keyed three times on size; one per test.
• PP-36 ⟂ PP-37 (the two typed "trait" items): one per test.
• PP-48 (minnow link) ⟂ PP-49 (pig's bell link): the language link run both ways; one per test.

Design-move inventory (move · scene kind · nearest earlier item)

Lesson-side moves the bank was read against: where did a born-with trait come from (L01 q3, q4, q6, VQ; PR-4); which thing is a trait (L01 q2); predict the young's trait (L01 q1, q7; PR-1); where did a life-event trait come from (L02 q1–q4, q7–q9, VQ; PR-5); claim: plants have no traits (L01 q5); claim: every trait from the parents (L02 q6); sort inherited / acquired with evidence (L03 q1–q8, VQ; PR-6, PR-7); claim: a scar inherited (L03 q9); three-way sort with evidence (L04 q1–q8, VQ; PR-8); claims on size (L04 q9, q10); FRQ both (L04); sort instinct / learned with evidence (L05 q1–q7, VQ; PR-9, PR-10); claims: trained dog's puppies, animals learn everything (L05 q8, q9); the link (L05 q10; PR-11); term items (L01 q8–q9; L03 q10–q11; L05 q11–q12; PR-12–PR-15).

Bank moves and their scene kinds, one line each: PP-1 born-with trait, a songbird's feathers; PP-2 born-with, a farm animal's spots; PP-3 born-with, a plant's flowers via runners; PP-4 which-is-a-trait, a wild rodent; PP-5 which-is-a-trait, a garden plant; PP-6 pick the parents' trait of three, a pet rodent; PP-7 the same, a farm animal; PP-8 predict the young, a wild mammal's tail; PP-9 life-event trait, a river mammal's injury; PP-10 life-event, a language learned; PP-11 life-event, a farm bird's injury; PP-12 life-event, a plant trained on a fence; PP-13 life-event, a worker's strength; PP-14 pick the life traits of three, a pet rodent; PP-15 the same, a farm animal; PP-16 the same, a tree; PP-17 which trait could come from life, a garden plant; PP-18 the same, a wild mammal; PP-19 sort I, a fish's spots; PP-20 sort A, a sea bird's habit; PP-21 sort I on a card, a wild mammal's mask; PP-22 sort A on a card, a farm animal's horn; PP-23 sort A near miss, a skill the parent shares; PP-24 pick the acquired trait of four, a wild mammal; PP-25 pick the inherited trait, a farm bird; PP-26 both, a zoo animal's height; PP-27 both, a giant fruit; PP-28 both on a card, a tree's height; PP-29 pick the both trait, a zoo animal; PP-30 the same, a crop; PP-31 sort instinct, an insect's building; PP-32 sort learned, a farm animal's gate; PP-33 instinct on a card, an insect's migration; PP-34 learned on a card, a wild rodent's feeder; PP-35 pick the learned behavior of three, a farm bird; PP-36 typed trait, a fish; PP-37 typed trait, a desert plant; PP-38 claim-reason injury inherited, a reptile; PP-39 claim-reason parent-has-it, a skill on horseback; PP-40 the young born without a learned skill, a farm animal; PP-41 multi-select size, a pony; PP-42 claim-reason size from parents alone, two piglets; PP-43 claim-reason plant size from care alone, two bean seedlings; PP-44 same parents → food, two fawns; PP-45 same care → parents, two kinds of marigold; PP-46 claim-reason trained young, a circus pony; PP-47 claim-reason everything learned, a reptile hatchling; PP-48 link born knowing → inherited, a fish; PP-49 link picked up → acquired, a pet pig; PP-50 the young born without a learned behavior, a wild bear.

Skill: course-build → review-lesson (Roles B, B2) · review-questions · review-accuracy @ fb37d14 — non-author review, filed by the coordinator from the reviewer's report

Topic 36 — guidance, questions and accuracy review, 2 October 2026

The science is right, the structure is right, and two cheap Essentials stand between it and the batch. The key-tell checker reads 12: in L02, the practice set and three bank items the "life" option always wears a colon tail and the "parents" option never does. And the rule the named misconception hangs on — "an acquired trait stays with the one that got it" — is in the L03 and L05 articles but in neither script, yet L03-q9 and L05-q8 test it. Re-performed: articles 248/299/344/293/346; scripts 145/148/148/149/149; intro 112; summary 152; bank 50, 10 per atom, keys A12 B12 C11 D12; Grade 3 recalls word for word; Topic 38's recap matches Topic 36's lexicon word for word.

Key-tell checker: KEY TELLS: 12 of 120 MCQs flagged (a: 9, b: 4, c: 0).

Essentials

1. The colon-tail / joiner family — pattern fix once (table). 2. L03 and L05 scripts lack the "stays with the one that got it" beat.

Worth fixing

1. L01 coins "trait" after Grade 3's "features" with no bridge. 4. "From the start" read literally fails petals and red feathers — one gloss line. 5. Dog continuity (L02's running dog is Sylvia's; L03 sorts it as Sonia's). 6. Seven quiz claims all "no". 7. Item cards print the deciding questions answered — rows become evidence, keep medium. 8. sort_card_terms lists "riding a bike? no" inside the inherited box. 9. "a surrounding" / "an offspring". 10. PP-17/18 odd-one-out tails; PR-2 hedged key. 11. Summary never says the stays-with rule. 12. PR-10 salmon "never made the trip before".

Leave

PP-23; "none of these" closers; Sonia/Stella/Sylvia (coordinator rules a rename anyway: Stella → a free name, as in the other topics); L02's video with no plant example; L05's link stems.

Author's questions: (1) coin "trait" — yes, with the bridge line. (2) MCQ-only — yes. (3) the dog unnamed — yes.

Skill: review-figures @ fb37d14 — non-author figure review with the page pass, filed by the coordinator from the reviewer's report

Topic 36 — figure review, 2 October 2026

What a student notices first: a pale green box and a pale orange box with a question written over each — the sort is visible before it is read. Then, on every item card, that the two questions are already answered.

Must fix before a cold read

1. All eleven item cards hand over the sort (L03 Q5, Q8; L04 Q8; L05 Q7; PR-07, PR-09; PP-21, 22, 28, 33, 34): each prints the deciding questions WITH their answers (yes / no / "partly; partly"), so the item only maps yes→inherited. Fix in _card: rows are facts — "FIRST SEEN: the day it was born" / "ITS PARENTS: both have a white coat" / "WHAT HAPPENED TO IT: nothing to do with its coat"; "both" cards "FIRST SEEN: it grew to this size over three years" / "ITS PARENTS: big horses" / "WHAT IT GOT: plenty of hay and grain". "Partly" goes. Blind text follows the rows. (Agrees with the guidance review's row 7.)
2. sort_card_terms lists "riding a bike? no: she learned it" INSIDE the inherited box and again in the acquired box. Drop the line (also the summary video's opening card).
3. Box tops uneven on every sort card (5 figures): the left question wraps to two lines. _bin takes top from the max line count.
4. family_cartoon brief will not show the trait at phone size: add "heads and shoulders fill the frame; the eye sees the three pairs of brown eyes first; no table clutter".

Page pass

Every figure renders alone; 0 broken images. Desktop legible (14.9–21 px). Phone (278 px column): sort/pair/three-bin cards 5.0–5.5 px, item cards 5.5–6.8 px (the asked cell 5.5–6.5), table_stella 5.3, rule cards 6.4–7.3. Fix in the drawer: _card as stacked rows (label over value), frame ≤300 units, 13-px type; sort cards two bins stacked at phone width. check_svg_ids.py: 44 figures, 0 ids, PASS. (Note: the shared builder changed tonight — c30858e — so re-measure after rebuilding.)

Sort-card audit

Alt text names no verdict; blind comments list rows as data; no tick/cross marks. Teaching figures sort_card_headache / three_bins_headache carry title chips the article never names, and the board_cartoon brief says the board's boxes are empty — two drawings of one board (minor).

Unplaced

parrot_photo — place at L05's "A parrot says 'hello'" line, or delete and keep pair_robin_parrot.

Minor

sort_card_dog / three_bins_filled boxes two-thirds empty (H = 100 + 18n). Briefs lacking "the eye sees first": scar_cartoon, dog_running_photo, shed_cartoon, bent_tree_photo ("wind from the left, tree bent to the right"). Count-bearing briefs: puppies four, robin chicks three. Nothing gory; all 16 briefs carry No text and style.

Best: height_card / dog_size_card; pair_spider_dog; table_puppies. Weakest: the eleven item cards; sort_card_terms; family_cartoon's brief.

Skill: course-build → review-lesson (Role A blind key read, two readers; Role C adjudication by the coordinator) @ fb37d14

Topic 36 — Traits from parents, and traits from life — blind read, 2 October 2026

Every key agreed by two blind readers (125 rows each; MCQ disagreements 0; typed "trait" on list; L04-11's written answer and PP-41 multi B, D matched). No item treats a scar or a learned skill as passed on. The fault is shape: the option with a colon tail ("from how it lived: the daily pulling") is the key every time it appears.

Flags carried into the fix pass

Readers' files: blind/2026-10-02/READER_A.md, READER_B.md.

Skill: review-lesson @ e23b67f — Role A, Reader C (cold blind read of BLIND_BUNDLE_G4T36.md, v2, items only)

Takeaway. The v2 bank reads clean. Every inherited-or-acquired stem now carries its evidence (born with it / parents have it, or a cause from its life); the trait cards print facts, not a verdict, and no row says "yes" or "no"; every "both" item names both causes in the stem, so one honest answer stands; every behaviour item says "nobody to show it / first time" or "after watching / rewarded / every day for years". The colon-tail tell is gone: "from how it lived" and "from its parents" are now the same shape. Two items I would hold: PP-13, where "from the weight of the bricks" is the very thing "how he lived" means, so two options are defensible; and PP-39, where the key is the longest option and carries "so … even though", with only one other long option beside it. One run to re-order: L03-01 to L03-04 alternate B A B A. The claim-verdict string on the seven "Is X right?" items is Y N N N Y N N — mixed, but a "no"-guesser scores five of seven.

Items

Adversarial answers (typed items)

(Any key that accepts "feature" — PR-02 uses "features" as the plain word — should be a deliberate decision; I would accept "trait" family only.)

Cross-item notes

• Length and shape tells: none in L01-L05, SUMMARY or PR. The colon-tail option is gone; "from how it lived" and "from its parents" are the same shape throughout. In PP, the full-sentence sets (PP-38, 40, 42-47, 50) keep the key off the longest option except PP-39.
• Evidence in every sort stem: yes. Each inherited item says "born with / hatched with" plus a parent who has it; each acquired item names the cause (fence, lessons, practice, trimming, a fall). L03-07 and PP-23 (parent has the skill too, but lessons) are the best items on the page.
• Card items (L03-05, L03-08, L04-08, L05-07, PR-07, PR-09, PP-21, PP-22, PP-28, PP-33, PP-34): the rows are facts only (the trait, when first seen, the parents, what happened); no row carries the sort word or a yes/no. "FIRST SEEN on its first day" plus "both parents have it" is the evidence the student must read — the same evidence the text stems give — not a give-away.
• "Both" items (L04-01, 04, 05, 08, V-01; PR-08; PP-26, 27, 28, 29, 30): each stem names a parent cause AND a life cause before asking; one honest answer. The parent-only items on the same page (L04-02, 06) give no life cause, so "both" is not defensible there.
• Behaviour items: every one says born doing it ("within an hour", "first time", "nobody to show it") or picked up ("after watching", "rewarded", "every day for years").
• Claim items: "Is X right?" string Y N N N Y N N (L01-05, L02-06, L03-09, L04-09, L04-10, L05-08, L05-09). Mixed, but five "no". One more true claim (e.g. a true instinct claim in L05) would balance it. The "X is wrong. What is the correct reason?" items (PP-38, 39, 42, 43, 46, 47) state the verdict, so they carry no verdict tell.
• Key runs: L03-01 to L03-04 alternate B A B A — four alternating keys; re-order one (S25). PP-01 to PP-03 all B, PP-04 to PP-05 both A — short runs, acceptable.
• Names: Sonia and Sylvia share the first letter and the "-ia" ending; a nine-year-old could read them as one at a glance. Low stakes, since no item names two children, but swapping Sonia for a name with a different first letter (e.g. Maya) would remove it. Tina is distinct.
• Near-duplicate frames: L03-01, L03-04 and L03-V-01 (white mark, mother has it) are three of one frame; fluency repetition is welcome by the format ladder, noted only.

Would not ship as is: PP-13, PP-39. Re-order before shipping: L03-01 to L03-04 (alternating run).