Being in a small school can be really tough because of being with the same kids year to year. What grade does middle school start there? Will he change schools then?
Since you mentioned science, one other thing that comes to mind that helped our ds tremendously was attending a science camp at one of our state universities during the first summer he as going into middle school. It was only two weeks long and was a day camp, but the intellectual level was a huge step up from the camps he'd been able to enroll in during middle school, and it was in a *lab* - he loved walking into that lab everyday and just hanging out with other kids who loved science. There were a lot of quirky kids there too - I suspect a lot of them felt a bit out of place during the regular school year.
I know we've been blessed where we live with choices and opportunities that aren't available everywhere, just mention them in case it brings an idea to mind that might work for others.
Re the pragmatic language test, your ds probably doesn't have those challenges, but fwiw, our ds was tested by a speech pathologist both times. I have a lot of faith and trust in his original speech pathologist who didn't see the issue (at least at first) - she's a great slp, and he worked with her for over 5 years (totally with challenges I'm sure your ds doesn't have), just mentioned it because when he was 10 and first evaluated by an slp, no one saw it. When he was 15 and evaluated, it was very obvious. I'm not sure why the difference in evals, but we've had this same thing happen on other occasions too with his challenges. He was first diagnosed with DCD and dysgraphia, and it wasn't until he'd been through OT for dysgraphia and had accommodations in place at school, as well as maturing just a few years, that anyone (teachers, parents, neuropsych) realized he had challenges with expressive language. He started speech therapy, and it wasn't until around 3-4 years in that his slp started finding additional challenges with pragmatics. I am sure each challenge was there all along, just not obvious because we were focused on other things. The evaluation he had (both times) for pragmatic language delays seems somewhat subjective too, at least not as easily quantifiable as a math achievement test for instance. Ultimately I don't think having or not having a diagnosis is what's important for the social issues for a child like your ds - what's important is having a caring adult (like you :)) watching closely, supporting him, thinking through and finding ways to help him develop the skills he needs, helping to be sure he is included and has social opportunities, and just being there for him so he knows that you care.
Best wishes,
polarbear
