How we write questions

Where questions come from

Each unit starts as a plan: a list of concepts it should cover and the difficulty range it should span. Questions are then written against that plan, with AI assistance, and reviewed and edited before being published. We think it is more useful to say that openly than to imply a large team of subject specialists that does not exist.

What that means practically is that the process is designed around catching errors rather than assuming there will not be any. The checks below are all applied before a question reaches you, and the corrections channel below exists because no process catches everything.

What every question must have

Questions are rejected automatically unless they meet a set of structural rules:

• •A clear prompt, and exactly one defensible correct answer for single-answer formats
• •An explanation, shown whether you get it right or wrong
• •Wrong options that are plausible and on-topic, never filler or jokes
• •No duplicate options, and no option that repeats the correct answer
• •A prompt that does not accidentally give away its own answer
• •A difficulty rating consistent with the step it appears in

A validator runs over the whole content set and blocks anything that breaks these rules, along with duplicate questions, questions referencing units or concepts that do not exist, and malformed data. Content that fails is fixed or dropped rather than published.

How difficulty works

Every question carries a difficulty level, and every step draws from a defined range. Early units in a subject sit at the lower levels and use concrete, everyday framing. Later units move up, introduce technical vocabulary and expect you to apply ideas rather than recall them.

Units are ordered so that each one can assume the ones before it. That is why the unit list on each subject page is presented as a sequence rather than a menu.

What we try to avoid

• •Trick questions that test reading comprehension rather than the subject
• •Ambiguous wording where more than one answer is arguably correct
• •Joke or nonsense options that make the right answer obvious by elimination
• •Presenting contested or unsettled matters as though they were settled
• •Cultural assumptions that make a question unanswerable for some learners

Subjects where we are careful

Some subjects need extra care. In Religion we describe what traditions believe and practise rather than arguing for or against any of them, and we note internal disagreement instead of flattening it. In Law and Citizenship we teach general principles and flag that specifics differ by country. This is general education and is not legal advice.

In history and the sciences, where the evidence is genuinely uncertain or the field is still arguing, we say so rather than picking a side and presenting it as fact.

Corrections

If you find a question that is wrong, ambiguous, out of date or unfair, we want to know. Email hello@brainsnail.com with the subject and unit name and, if you can, the question text. That is enough for us to find it.

Corrections are made directly to the question bank and reach the app and this website without waiting for a new release, so a reported error can be fixed the same day.

About the blog

Blog articles are written to explain one topic clearly and are edited to the same standards: no invented sources, no fabricated statistics, and open acknowledgement where a question is disputed or unresolved. Where a popular claim does not hold up, we say that rather than repeating it.

They are drafted with AI assistance and reviewed before publishing, in the same way the question bank is, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise. Every article is checked against a duplicate detector before it goes live, so the blog stays a set of distinct explainers rather than the same piece rewritten. Each one is meant to be worth reading on its own, whether or not you ever open the app. If one falls short of that, tell us and we will fix or remove it.

Articles are general education. Nothing on this site is medical, legal or financial advice.