Hi Cat -
He goes to a place called Mathnasium. I think you can find it on the internet. They do a written assessment (usually start with current grade level and then move up) and then also ask him a few things verbally - e.g., if he misses a couple of problems of one type they will sit with him and have him explain and try to see if he is making careless errors or if it is a topic he doesn't know. Based upon this assessment they will determine which things he should learn and then create a binder of materials. First page of a lesson will have an explanation of how to do something and some examples - teacher will go over this with him - then next pages will have some practice - teacher monitors as he does them - then he will have a mastery check to see that he knows that topic after some practice. They kind of adjust as he goes along - if it is clear that he knows it after one page of work he will skip the rest of the problems and do the final check and move on. After completing a grade level, they redo the initial assessment to make sure he is solid in everything - more practice on anything that he needs to do. Then they move on to assessment for next grade level.
We started towards the end of first grade when he told me he just couldn't take first grade anymore - no one teaches him any math and he needs to learn new stuff. He asked me to teach him more at home, but it was hard for me to figure out exactly what to teach him and I have three other sons that need my attention. This was our compromise and it has worked out well so far.
The director has been really flexible. I was not keen on moving through too many grade levels too quickly so he added some extra stuff within grade levels. However, my son seems happy enough moving through more grade levels and I have finally figured out that he is never going to fit in nicely with what kids are doing in school anyway, so I don't really care anymore as long as he is happy learning what he wants to learn.
In my opinion they teach things in the more traditional, logical way, at least as compared to the way that things are taught in our public school system. My older son is in our public GT center school, so does math that is supposed to be one grade up but I have found Mathnasium's stuff to be a little more complete than what our local school system teaches.
My son does love going there. He learns something a little new each day and doesn't have to spend time doing a bunch of stuff he learned years ago. He gets lots of positive feedback - from teachers and also from some of the older girls (middle and high school kids I think) who think he is just so cute when he does his quirky math stuff - reciting pi and telling them odd factual stuff he knows.
Anyway, for now it works although I keep wishing we could find a way for him to do math at school so we would not have the extra time and expense!
