I wanted to say thanks for the input!! Sorry, I was out of town for the last week. As we left for vacation, we were quite convinced that AOPS PreA at my son's pace would be a great fit, and he was committed to doing the work with me. (And enthusiastic about it in a way he has never been when I've suggested math at home in the past!) But while we were on vacation, the counselor called and told us the math teacher really wanted to speak with us. So I brought my son to the school last Thursday.
The teacher said everything DS wanted to hear, about challenge in the figuring-out end of things as well as just in the volume and content end of things. The teacher was adamant that he KNOWS what smart students go through in an undifferentiated elementary school, that sometimes they don't even understand yet how smart they ARE because they haven't had that chance to stretch, that he is a teacher explicitly in order to provide that challenge to students.
The teacher considers his class to be a compacted 7th-and-8th grade course, which prepares for Algebra. So it amounts to a double subject skip. I am not completely convinced that it will be enough, but DS is now quite ready to give it a try. I think it will be good for him to be a class with one math-talented 6th grader and a room full of math-interested 7th graders. And in a few weeks if it's still tedious...we can give something else a try.
So, wish us luck!! Especially with the small-town drama. Apparently there are a LOT of people upset because their kids didn't get into this accelerated class. Even though a special "advanced" class got created for them instead. Sigh.
