How old were you/did you turn in 3rd grade?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Tonight I learned that someone I know will be teaching 3rd grade this year. I commented that I couldn’t imagine her being in charge of a group of 9 year olds. Two friends then argued with me that her students would be 7/8. I stated I definitely turned 9 in 3rd grade. They both looked at me like I had two heads, which pissed me off, because I know I turned 9 that year and didn’t appreciate being looked at like I was an idiot. But getting back to the point, I know I turned 9, and they’re convinced that 3rd grade is for 7 and 8 year olds. One of them is an elementary school teacher, so I don’t get it.

So what’s your experience? Or parents, what is the experience with your children? I’m so confused! :confused:

2

3rd grade was one of my favorite years in school. I entered at 7 and turned 8 in January.

3

I went to the first few years of grade school in Louisiana, where school starts in August. (I remember how weird my sister and I thought it was when we moved to Pennsylvania and didn’t have to go to school till September.) My birthday is at the end of September, so I was only four years old when I entered kindergarten. So I was seven years old when I started third grade and turned eight a month later.

4

I was born in '78, I was in grade three during the years '86-'87. In June of '87, just before school let out, I would have turned… does the math:

Nine. So, I’d say grade three is made up roughly of eight- and nine-year olds.

5

Nearly everybody in my 3rd grade was 8 on the first day of school. The oldest kid turned 9 in October, the youngest turned eight in October. Everyone else turned 9 sometime during the school year, or during the summer following.

Kids are suposed to start
Kindergarten at 5
1st Grade at 6
2nd grade at 7
and so on.

6

But that means you’re a late baby, so it’s like you would have turned 8 at the end of second grade, so to speak.

I’m a January baby FWIW.

7

Sorry that was referring to Harimad-Sol.

8

I had just turned 7 at the start of 3rd class, as we called it here back then, but I had skipped 2nd class and was thus markedly younger and smaller than everyone else in my class.*

  • and continued that way through my whole school career. Which I do not recommend to anyone, especially at an all boy school.
9

Unless there’s something funky going on with birthdates and cut-off dates, or this isn’t your usual American school, most kids will be 8 or 9. 7/8 is generally second grade. Tell them a real, live teacher says so. saramamalana, you should be the one looking at them like they’ve got extra heads.

10

Yes. Cut-off dates are the real issue, I think. I went to high school with a girl whose birthday was in December, so I remember her still being sixteen for the first bit of senior year. I was relieved to know someone in my year was younger than I was. Some school districts, IIRC, set the cut-off at September 30, so someone who didn’t make it would have to wait a year and thus be older than the rest of the class.

11

My friend from 3rd grade actually didn’t start school until he was just about to turn six. Parents have a lot of leeway about when to start their kids in school. They usually do it at 5, though.

12

When I was looking for confirmation of my memory of the cut-off date in Alberta being the end of February, I found this list of cut-off dates in North America. Where I grew up, the cut-off date is December 31 and my birthday’s mid-October, so I turned 8 roughly 6 weeks into grade 3. It also meant that when I went to university I got to have fun watching people’s reactions at the beginning of first year when I quite honestly said that I was 17.

13

I was 8 when I started the 3rd grade, turned 9 in January. Almost all of the kids I went to school with also started at 8, then turned 9 during the school year or the following summer.

14

I started kindergarten at age five with my birthday in September.

I was eight-going-on-nine when I went into 3rd grade.

So, nine years old. You got it, ace.

15

My birthday is in August. I had just turned 8 years old going into 3rd grade.

Both of my sons were born in March so they were 8 going into 3rd, 9 by the time the school year ended.

Sounds like you got it right to me, too.

16

At the beginning of 3rd class (January) I was 7. I turned 8 in May, roughly half way through 3rd class.

17

I’m a July birthday, so I was eight for all of 3rd grade. They were playing with the cut off dates when I started school in the town where I went to school, so I was actually 19 days after it. But I tested or something well enough that they let me start. It was a private school, so the town’s rules were merely guidelines to them.

18

3rd class - 1962. Started in January, as is the custom here, and turned nine in October.

19

Started 3rd grade at 7, turned 8 in mid-September. I was, however, one of the youngest people in the class. Most people came in at 8 and turned 9 sometime during the year.

20

In the USA it’s most normal for children to be eight or nine years old during the third grade. Seven would be a bit ahead of the norm. So your friends were either gifted/skipped ahead a grade, didn’t attend school in the USA (or didn’t attend a standard US curriculum) , or are misremembering things.

  • Shibb, who has a seven year old currently in 2nd grade, a nine year old in 4th grade, and was eight years old during all of 3rd grade, although he turned 9 in the following July.