It's impossible to say from your brief description whether your son does simply needs time to mature, and will "grow out of it". I confess though, my gut reaction to what you've written is "don't count on it".
It's equally impossible to say from your description whether he is gifted. But for what it's worth, I would say he is behaving in a common way for a gifted kid in a frustrating and badly-fitting environment. Gifted kids tend to have a huge thirst to learn, and deserve to spend as much time learning, and being taught, as their peers - they are not at school to be an unpaid teacher's helper. It's helpful to compare his behaviour at school vs other places. Does he have other activities where he is being taught at a much more challenging level (say, a chess club, or lego or robotics or some other extra-curricular in which he is deeply engaged)? Do you see the same behaviours in all environments, or different ones in environments that meet his needs vs those that don't?
I really can't over-state the effects of a badly-fitting environment. The greater the outlier, the bigger the problem can be. It's quite common for gifted kids in a regular classroom to instead be labelled ADHD, oppositional/ defiant, ASD and others. With shocking frequency, those symptoms disappear if the child is placed in a class full of gifted peers (though unfortunately, such classes are far too uncommon). Of course, lots of kids are both gifted and have other exceptionalities (especially on this forum). Even so, research shows the best way to teach is by supporting their weaknesses but engaging them at the level of their intellectual strengths. Easier material is actually harder for them to cope with.
Some gifted kids, despite having different learning needs, still engage well socially and emotionally with their age-peers through some common interests. Boys especially might connect through sports, where there can be both equal intensity of interest as well as equal ability. However, not all gifted boys like sports. And many gifted kids have highly-divergent interests from their age peers - and are really intense, deep and passionate about those interests. Sound familiar? If your child is already there, I hate to say this, but I really wouldn't count on them becoming less divergent from their peers over time. More able to cope socially with those differences, yes. But also, quite likely, noticeably more different as time goes on.
Chay offers some great suggestions for talking with your husband. It sounds like you have each defined a quite different problem, and so not surprisingly, are seeing quite different solutions. Actual data to help you better understand your child's needs would likely be a helpful place to start: I found it incredibly useful to have actual numbers - imperfect as they definitely are - that objectively stated my child's needs separate from my own projections, hopes, fears, frustrations, childhood experiences and ego. If your child is an outlier, it can be incredibly freeing to see that in black and white, and realize it's ok to not expect this kid to function the way everyone else does, he actually is objectively different and has different needs.
Even knowing his needs, however, there isn't one right way to respond to them. It may be helpful to explicitly separate the issues of "gathering data to define the problem" vs. "analyzing potential solutions". We all carry baggage from our own school experiences, and as we've seen from many discussions on this forum, it's amazing how much that shapes our reactions now. As chay suggests, the more you and your husband can understand each other's school's experiences, and talk openly about what parts may or may not apply to your kids, and what ways your kids are - and are not - like you, the better you can try and see what makes sense, in the here and now, for this unique child in front of you. Many of us carry scars we don't even know about, and those can make it hard to get on the same page as our partner. It takes time, and lots of open-ended conversations. As much as possible, perhaps try to get both of you to drop for a while your ideas about both the nature of the problem, and the solution you favour. Instead, just explore your own experiences, and what you now see in this child. For myself, I had clear - and completely inaccurate - ideas of what gifted was and needed. My children's needs are so utterly, fundamentally different from my own that it is my constant challenge to meet them where they are, and not where I think they ought to be. It's been an incredible learning experience, though! Best wishes to you both.
