Hi, frannieandejsmom. If your goal is to get the school to recognize that EJ is ready for more advanced work, at the very least make sure that his teacher records in his file that he's getting more advanced work, what exactly it is (possibly with work samples), and how he's performing with it. Such info may easily be lost in the year-to-year shuffle.
I'm beginning to realize that a lot of gifted children find that the first years of math in elementary are wasted, if they're stuck with the normal curriculum. I chalk this up to the fact that a lot of kids hit kindergarten with little to no math exposure, even less than reading exposure in some cases, and the fact that a lot of schools don't differentiate much before the third grade.
(ETA: Looking back at a prior post of yours, it looks like EJ scored at the 99th percentile for 3rd grade in math. There's no way I would continue letting him be given first grade math work. I'd do whatever you have to do to get this changed for him. In my personal opinion, the school's continuing to give him such obviously mastered work is abusive.)
You could afterschool him. That might do a better job of keeping his spark going, since you know what he enjoys and can handle better than his teacher. Have you checked out the Mathematics Enhancement Programme? It's free, and he might like it. Maybe you could quickly afterschool him up to the third grade, skipping a lot of the early boring drudgework, and then he could try the new Beast Academy.
What challenge math did he find too easy, "Ed Zaccaro Challenge Math" or something else?
Is there additional testing you can request of the school? IQ and/or achievement testing might provide evidence that they can't ignore. I think you live in an area where they use the MAP, right? If his percentiles support it, I might ask for him to be exempted from the normal class work.
In "Developing Math Talent", the authors warn against using end-of-year math tests to prove readiness for subject acceleration. I think that a lot of the reasons why this is true wouldn't apply so much to the early grades and a highly gifted student, though-- and many teachers and school admins might not be up on the gifted literature (the understatement of the year, maybe). Your son would probably ace the end of year test at his current grade level.
