Cautionary tale, though not for the reasons you might think...
My DS, now 8, skipped 1st grade. The thinking behind the skip was that the 1st grade curriculum - geared mainly toward teaching kids to read - would be like purgatory for him. DS was super excited to go to 2nd grade instead of 1st.
In hindsight, I think I was very naive about what the skip would mean for him and allowed myself to become very excited about putting a "floor" underneath him, thinking he'd flourish once he got past the "learning to read year" in school (in K he was already on a 3rd+ reading level, and about the same for math). My excitement clearly rubbed off on him, and he went into 2nd with HUGE expectations of tons of glorious learning, all day long!
By November of 2nd grade, I wound up pulling him out of school to homeschool because he was miserable and dispirited. He broke down in tears one morning, claiming he never learned anything and would be sick if he wasn't allowed to learn.
I don't regret the skip, though. We homeschooled for remainder of 2nd, and preserved the skip when he reentered public school the following year. Not great in 3rd either, but at least he had a better teacher and I learned to be "polite-pushy" to get at least some differentiation in the work he does (some of which I send in). We also after school and summer school at DS' request. He really isn't happy unless he's learning.
Beyond just getting a skip, I wish I'd had a chance to talk to the receiving teacher in advance and work out a plan for adhering to his gifted EP -- perhaps it would have made a difference. I don't think his teacher that year understood giftedness at all, especially the misery brought on by constant repetition and snail-pacing.
FWIW, re: the handwriting...
My DS had excellent handwriting at home prior to starting K, and a few months into K was frustrated because of his teacher's complaints about his handwriting. After meeting with his teacher, I solved the puzzle.
At home, DS had been writing on ONE line in composition notebooks. At school, he was expected to write huge letters, also on lined paper -- the kind resembling sentence strips. When his teacher and I compared samples of his writing, it became obvious that DS was simply not capable of writing on those huge lines. His K teacher said writing on one normal-sized line was an advanced skill -- even in 1st they used the huge lined paper. Once she saw for herself that he had fantastic handwriting on regular paper, she never gave him the standard K paper again.
So, at least in our case, he really did not have a handwriting issue at all. Just could not produce large enough letters to be seen from the moon! (We giggle over this now, but it was a big deal and soured much of his K experience).
Good luck!
I think 1st grade *was* like purgatory for my DC and it was even a little damaging due to boredom and acting out. However, I agree with your advice not to be over-excited about a skip as it won't fix everything. So much has to do with the teachers involved, also.
Good luck! See if your school will use the IOWA acceleration scale and ask for very motivated teachers.
