CAMom - I watched the entire Richard Rusczyk lecture that you posted and am in complete agreement. I would rather DS10 be placed in a math class where he is challenged and maybe gets a B, but makes growth than a class where he gets an A but repeats things he already knows. After watching that lecture, I am also thinking of signing him up for the AoPS AMC-8/Mathcounts class that starts at the end of May. There is also a CTY course called "Honors Problem Solving in Pre-Algebra" and I thought that this might be good for him to do now, even though he is technically beyond Pre-algebra. The problem solving approach of both of these would seem like good preparation for Algebra 1 in the fall. Plus if he received a good grade in a CTY Honors Pre-Algebra course, I'm not sure that anyone could argue with the placement. We typically do some type of CTY course in the summer anyway - DS10 needs the stimulation. There are no competitive math teams in our area, but I really feel like MathCounts would be an excellent opportunity for him (and others, I'm sure) if we can find someone to run it. Thanks for all of the direction - I'm going to have to see if I can find some more Richard Rusczyk info/lectures, it was really good info.
