I also skipped the second grade, so I entered 3rd grade at age 7 in September and did not turn 8 until the end of May. I graduated from high school a week after my 17th birthday.
I had the misfurtune of being born in mid November (try and guess when I was conceived,) and so, with the cuttof date in Vermont being as late as January 1st ( :eek: ), I entered Kindergarden at age four, and was age four for two and a half months before turning five. So I was seven when I entered third grade, and elft thrid grade at 8. Most kids I know wehre either 8 when the entered and turned 9 during, and turned eight over the summer. There were a few kids who had birthdays in Sep. or Oct.
And yes, I was the youngest in my class, up until HS when a coupel of twins from a year below me skipped ahead a grade.
I started Kindergarten in 1963 at age 4 and turned 5 in October. So I would have started Grade 3 in September 1966 at age 7 and turned 8 in October.
That was my experience. I went in at age 7 and turned 8 in mid-October. In my town, you had to turn 5 by 12/31 of the year you entered kindergarten, so many children started kindergarten at 4. On the other hand, parents didn’t HAVE to start their children in kindergarten at age 4 even if the kid would turn 5 by 12/31; if they chose to, they could wait a whole year before starting kindergarten. Therefore, some kids would enter kindergarten at 5-almost-6. This would make them enter third grade at 8-almost-9. So 3rd grade can be for anyone from 7-9.
Some schools require that children be 5 by September 1 of the year they start. Children who turn 5 on September 2 have to until the next year, and end up being “older” than many of their classmates.
There is no “one way” in the U.S. It all depends on how the cutoff dates are set up, and when parents are allowed to start or delay enrolling their children in kindergarten.
The city I lived in had an October 1st cut off date for starting K, so very nearly every child in my class was eight and turned nine sometime during the year or that summer.
I started at age 7 and turned 8 during the year but my mom held me back from kindergarten so I was old for my grade.
Sept birthday, started out as 8, turned 9 within the first month of school.
Same.
I love you all. 
Really, thank you for helping me maintain my sanity. Of the two friends in question, one is an elementary school teacher but didn’t grow up here, and the other did grow up here but teaches high school. Sometimes I just need to be right, but this was more about checking that I wasn’t the only one sure of this.
OTOH it’s funny to read people working out the math of how old they were at what time. I’m just one of those people that *knows *how old I was in whichever grade. I also have the benefit of being a 1980 baby so the math is a bit easier, heh.
I either started at 7, and turned 8 VERY shortly after the first day of school, or was 8 when the year started.
September 8 is a horrible birthdate, as I most often had my 1st day of school on my birthday which means:
a) Summer ended ON my birthday, not the happiest day of the year. or…
b) Nobody knew it was my birthday, and I got no acknolwlegement/party, etc, like the rest of the class.
You were old for your grade but started first grade at age 5? Did the other first graders start at age four? Where did you go to school?
Cutoff date here (hi, Shibb!) is September 1st. I was born 6/7/73, so I was 5 when I started Kindergarten in August of 78, 6 when I entered 1st grade, 7 for 2nd, etc… I was one of the youngest kids in the class, which is why my Mom wouldn’t let me skip a grade in elementary school. The coolest thing was I graduated from high school on my 18th birthday (Class of 91 Rocks!).
I have a niece who will turn 5 on 9/15. Her parents (my sister in law and her husband) are sending her to private school. They just couldn’t see keeping her back because of two weeks. I don’t blame them.
My husband’s bday is 9/2. He started school up north, so he graduated from HS and entered the Navy in 1983 while still 17.
I was 7. But that’s the norm here. We’re smarter (heh) so we start school earlier and finish earlier. Also, our school year is end of Jan to mid December.
My birthday is in August, and I skipped kindergarten, so I had just turned five when I started first grade, which means I had just turned 7 when I started 3rd. But because of that skipping, I was 1-2 years younger than everyone else in my class. (For the rest of my school career, as well. I was 16 when I graduated from high school and 20 when I graduated from college.)
So yeah. Third grade in US schools should be about 8-9 year olds.
Hmm…lessee, my brother was born ten days after my eighth birthday, and that would have been towards the end of was in second grade (our birthdays are in March), so I started as eight and turned nine in third.
I was 8 when I started, but turned 9 in January of third grade. My sone, an August baby will turn 8 just days before starting third grade next year.
Entered third grade at eight, turned nine that January.
I entered the second grade at 6 and then skipped the third grade so I was 7 in the fourth grade. Everyone just thought I was a small kid but I was too embarassed to tell them my real age. At 15 I could bluff my way into bars with my legal aged friends.
Ditto, except my birthday was the end of the month, October 30.
I was in third grade back in 1962.
Cut-off dates have changed.
And a lot more people hold their kids back now.
I was 14.
It’s a long story.