Thanks for everyone's response. I think I understand better what was going on, and am significantly less worried about the situation now. The assessment in French covered only math. That led us to believe his math abilities were being assessed. In fact, what they cared about mostly was his level of French. That's pretty high, especially for a non-native speaker, but not so high that they thought he needed to be in an enriched French environment. When they said that he would feel adequately challenged in first grade what they meant was that there are things he can improve language-wise, at least at the start, that will keep him busy. They do have a plan for pull-out math, are open to putting him up a grade in math if appropriate, and have a pull-out plan for English reading as well.
We had the whole conversation in English, and like us the director is a native speaker. It just goes to show that communication is difficult even if everyone is speaking the same language.
