Back story: I am an ex-primary school teacher and have taught all the year groups. I have posted before regarding DS's well above average mathematical ability and his independent school's failure to challenge him. He has strong verbal skills too, and is exceeding expectations in all areas. For three years now, we have been asking school to provide more challenge to him in maths. School initially denied that DS wasn't being challenged even though they could not give any examples as to how. We were on the brink of changing schools, but pulled back because he is otherwise in a lovely year group with several strong friendships, because of the uncertainty surrounding Covid, and because of the lack of availability of state school places near to us anyway.
We have so far had two meetings with the Head, and have a further 'catch-up' meeting scheduled. We have virtually begged for our son to be challenged more, and the Head fervently replied that challenge was what they were all about. School has now redeveloped its maths curriculum, which is based on White Rose, but is part bespoke, this latter bit appearing to consist of intermittent revision weeks 'to help put the learning into the children's long term memory', notwithstanding the spiral nature of the maths curriculum in England anyway.
Now that he is in Year 3, DS brings home his school maths book to do his homework in. The work he has done is at the same level as that which he was doing in Year 2, which was already too easy. He is just treading water here.
To be fair, his teacher has provided a 'challenge' sheet just for him, although it is unrelated to the strand of maths being taught. It is an open-ended problem which asks 'Which of these numbers can you combine to make 100?' and so could run for weeks. Meanwhile, the bulk of his lesson is taken up with the usual introduction and main activity, which appears to be differentiated for the class to two different levels as has been the case ever since he started school.
It appears to be school's unwritten policy only to differentiate maths work to two levels of ability all the way up to Year 6. Despite our conversations with the Head, I don't see them shifting on this. One could argue that as there are only 20 children in the class and it is two-form entry, surely in their planning the two teachers have capacity to consider the actual cohort in question and differentiate according to actual need rather than to Year 3 expectations (especially as a TA supports in class), but No. Or rather, 'Yes we do, but in reality No we do not'. At every stage, school have talked the talk but they have not walked the walk. They are outstanding at this, beyond all expectations.
If we were to start again, I don't think we would have sent DS to this school and he might well have been better served going to a nearby State school. But we really don't want to move DS away from a school where he is so well settled, so are now wondering whether to push for DS to be put into Year 4, just for maths lessons, remaining with his Year 3 class the rest of the time. Having looked at the maths curriculum, I can see that this would provide a far better 'biting point' for him. I think school are more likely to agree to this rather than to a wider in-class differentiation. My one reservation would be that, if he went forward a year for maths, what would happen when he reached Year 6? Has anyone else's child ever gone forward, and how did it ultimately work through?