Rebecca, yes, I think that I see where you are coming from. Maybe this need of yours takes us back to Mary's comments above.
I don't have quite as many resources below each of my normal 15 topics per course situation. My busiest course has 18 topics and an average of 8 or so resources per topic. I have been using Collapsed Topics for over two years and really like it. My students have never (yes, "never") complained. In Moodle 3.3, the topic navigation is on the Drawer, so students might close all topics, then navigate to each topic from the Drawer. Well, yep, we all like to do things a little differently.
One thing that helps me is that for every topic, I have a "Resources and Activities" (external) webpage that provides a lot of details to the student about the topic. If I took a different approach, then maybe I too would have more resource links in each Moodle topic. I will give you a screen shot of what my own Moodle looks like, and here is a link to this week's current (yellow) Resources and Activities webpage. This technique provides an easy way for students to "print" a copy of what is happening on this topic. You will see many more links and videos built into this webpage. I am giving this to you just to show various ways of doing things, not to say "do this my way."
If any of this makes any sense to you, and you need more information, I can provide it.
(Incidentally, this technique of keeping my Resources webpage external makes it very easy for me to share with others, like you.)
