Curriculum Compacting

Curriculum Compacting is a procedure for modifying regular curriculum for high ability students. This videotape of a live broadcast includes an explanation of the compacting process, a brief rationale as to why this is so necessary (including the dumbing down of textbooks and data related to how much content bright youngsters already know) and a discussion of each of the following eight steps involved in curriculum compacting:

Select the learning objectives for a given subject.
Find or create an appropriate way to pretest or alternatively assess competencies related to these objectives.
Identify students who may have mastered the objectives, or have the potential to master them at a faster than normal pace, or pretest all students in the classroom.
Pretest students-before beginning instruction-on one or more of the objectives.
Streamline practice, drill or instructional time for students who have learned the objectives.
Provide instructional options for students who have not yet attained all the pretested objectives, but generally learn faster than their classmates.
Organize and recommend enrichment or acceleration options for eligible students.
Keep records of the process and instructional options available to students whose curriculum has been compacted for reporting to parents and forward these records to next year's teachers.

This videotape focuses on implementing Curriculum Compacting at the elementary level and will point out the important distinction between basic skill compacting and content compacting. It also includes a summary of results on a national research study on Curriculum Compacting conducted by the NRC/GT. Two guides accompany the videotape on compacting (guide for teachers and facilitators' guide) that provide extensive information on the topic.

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