We are in just about the same situation. DS10 is in 6th grade math this year and has not learned a single new concept this year and knows almost all of next year's prealgebra curriculum as well. He's never missed more than one problem on any of the tests and we have talked to his teacher about how everything this year is a review. He has even pointed out to his teacher that he did a lot of the seventh grade work last year at a different school (his teacher also teaches prealgebra and DS has seen their assignments). His teacher knows all this and will be giving him a math placement test to see if he is ready for Algebra I next year, and yet, from all our previous dealings with our daughter, we know that the likelihood of his being placed into Algebra I is slim, regardless of how he does on the placement test. My older DD took and did well on three of these tests and yet the school said she couldn't do Algebra because of "holes." Nothing we said could convince them that she actually looked forward to "holes" - that meant she would actually learn something in school. The only thing that worked for DD was for us to insist that we, her parents, would take all the blame if it all went wrong if they would just let her try. We would have signed papers attesting to that, if asked. Only then was the school willing to let her take Algebra I. And lo and behold, she got an easy A and had fewer gaps than many of the kids in the class with her who had gone through pre-Algebra.
So, anyway, we are in the same boat with DS right now, and preparing for resistance from the school. You would think that if a kid liked math and was good at math and wanted to learn higher level math that the school and teachers would be thrilled and at least encourage the student to try. The other pipe dream would be for math teachers to become mentors to such children and actually encourage them!
