Time lag in curriculum occurs when the content that children are learning in school today lags behind what they will be expected to know and do with that knowledge when they grow up. Innovative approaches to curriculum design that may minimize time lags include:

1. Digital curriculum can include digital content or organisational features to implement curricular elements, online materials, tools, depositories, hardware, software and other applications.
2. Personalised, individualised, differentiated or tailored curriculum is a curriculum that is tailored to students’ individual needs, skills and interests. When combined with technology, students can learn anywhere, anytime.
3. Cross-curricular content and competency-based curriculum are built across disciplinary or subject boundaries.
4. Flexible curriculum allows schools, teachers and local bodies to adapt, implement or modify curriculum (learning content, goals, pedagogies and assessments).

Attempting to keep curriculum aligned with newly emerging needs of the economy and society can lead to a situation where curriculum becomes overloaded, particularly if there is inadequate consideration at the curriculum design stage of what is included, what is removed, and why. Some potential strategies for addressing curriculum overload include:

• regulating learning time;
• carefully defining the pitch of what is included in curriculum;
• keeping the right balance between breadth of learning areas and depth of content knowledge;
• building in coherent learning progressions across grades and education levels;
• focusing on conceptual understanding or “big ideas” to avoid an excessive number of subjects or topics within the allotted time l managing perceptions of overload by adjusting the size and/or format of curriculum documents;
• using focus, rigour and coherence jointly as key design principles when addressing curriculum overload.