This story reminds me of my experience growing up and going to public school in Ohio (in the United States). When I did classwork, I did it very well. When I took tests, I was always in the top of my class (which led to me being in the highest-level classes offered at my schools). And when it came to class participation, the teachers always had praise for me. I spent most of my time outside of school learning new things from books, the internet, and everyone around me.
But I almost never did my homework.
This was almost the sole source of strife between my mother and I, and between both of us and school administrators. Going from 8th to 9th grade required a special exception, and recommendations from almost every one of my teachers, as my GPA was below the point normally required to progress to the next grade. I am lucky in that the teachers I had were sympathetic enough to stand up for me, and confident in my abilities using other methods of evaluation.
We (my mother and I) considered other schools, other formats of school, but in the end we settled on something modeled after Unschooling. When I was 13-going-on-14, halfway through my 9th grade year (freshman year of high school in the United States), my mother took me out of school using the legal provision for homeschooling. As she was a single working mother, I spent the rest of the years that my peers were in high school learning things on my own and seeking out my own learning opportunities. (A year or so later, I learned C, Objective-C, and the Cocoa frameworks and started a Mac applications business a year or so later with friends I met on the internet.)
Granted, I had the following things going for me: a supportive mother, generally being "well-behaved", living in a small town where it was safe to leave me to my own devices, living in a college town which gave me access to more learning resources, and an in-built self-motivated learning style. I also think it helped that I went through the public school system for many years before I left, as it meant I had friends and a social life that stuck with me even after leaving the school itself. So, I'm sure it's not for everyone, but for some, and maybe OP's son, it's worth considering.
But I almost never did my homework.
This was almost the sole source of strife between my mother and I, and between both of us and school administrators. Going from 8th to 9th grade required a special exception, and recommendations from almost every one of my teachers, as my GPA was below the point normally required to progress to the next grade. I am lucky in that the teachers I had were sympathetic enough to stand up for me, and confident in my abilities using other methods of evaluation.
We (my mother and I) considered other schools, other formats of school, but in the end we settled on something modeled after Unschooling. When I was 13-going-on-14, halfway through my 9th grade year (freshman year of high school in the United States), my mother took me out of school using the legal provision for homeschooling. As she was a single working mother, I spent the rest of the years that my peers were in high school learning things on my own and seeking out my own learning opportunities. (A year or so later, I learned C, Objective-C, and the Cocoa frameworks and started a Mac applications business a year or so later with friends I met on the internet.)
Granted, I had the following things going for me: a supportive mother, generally being "well-behaved", living in a small town where it was safe to leave me to my own devices, living in a college town which gave me access to more learning resources, and an in-built self-motivated learning style. I also think it helped that I went through the public school system for many years before I left, as it meant I had friends and a social life that stuck with me even after leaving the school itself. So, I'm sure it's not for everyone, but for some, and maybe OP's son, it's worth considering.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unschooling