Thanks for the reminder about your son's situation, Questions. As a visual person, I find that I often have a hard time keeping people's situations straight on the forum since I can't see faces. Please forgive my forgetfulness.
Let me preface what I'm about to say with this: I don't think every kid needs to be home schooled. It's just one more possibility in the list of possible educational options as far as I'm concerned. We've tried public school, home school, and now we're considering a private gifted school for next year, so I really have no deep allegiances with any educational philosophy. But with that said...
I do think that in some cases, home schooling is a wonderful and highly useful possibility. It has been a lifesaver for us this year, and we don't even have the extra challenge of LD issues that you have.
If you just want to supplement what's happening in the school building, that's considered "afterschooling" and it's a type of home schooling, too. I think afterschooling can tend to be harder to do well, since you get a kid who comes home already tired (and possibly frustrated and cranky) from a long day of school. But how afterschooling goes has a lot to do with the specific child's personality and school fit, I think. If afterschooling works for your child, it's a fantastic option! (It wouldn't have worked for our DS, who was so cranky and frustrated after a day of school that he was impossible to deal with!)
As for full-on home schooling, I know that many people with kids who don't really fit the school's template for "the normal kid" can do quite well with it. It allows you to tailor the education to your child 100%. That's especially helpful with a 2E kid like you've got, since you can both play to his strengths and build up those areas where he demonstrates weaknesses.
I guess my advice would be to look into home schooling and see what you think, see if it's something you think you can/want to do. It seems like your child is the exact sort of person who has the most to gain from home schooling, really. You can always decide it's not for you and go on as you are now or switch schools, right? You lose nothing by looking.
FWIW, I don't think grade advancement is always required for an HG+, especially when there are complicating factors like LDs. But I do think you'll probably have to do something to address his GTness eventually, one way or another. And the more GT the kid is, the more significant the "something" has to be and the sooner "eventually" will arrive.
Finally, if it helps, I don't think that any of the options you're considering are bad ones.
If your son is happy where he is, I'd be tempted to keep him there and afterschool him, but that's just my knee-jerk reaction. Is he showing improvement in his areas of relative weakness this year? Do you think he's going to make up some ground there this year, or is he still going to need significant help and OT in those areas next year and on into the future? That would also be a huge factor in the decision if I were in your shoes. If he needs the OT that the school is providing this year, then staying there and afterschooling or else full-fledged home schooling sound like your better choices to me.
Hang in there!
