Common year facts for kids

A common year is a year that is not a leap year. In the Gregorian Calendar a common year has 365 days. This means a common year has 52 weeks and one day. So if a certain year started on a Monday, the following year will start on a Tuesday. Stated differently, a common year always begins and ends on the same day of the week. (For example, in 2009, both January 1 and December 31 fell on a Thursday.)

In the Gregorian calendar, 303 out of every 400 years are common years. In the Julian calendar, 300 out of every 400 years were common years. All the other years are special and known as leap years.

2001 began on a Monday
2002 began on a Tuesday
2003 began on a Wednesday
2004, a leap year, began on a Thursday
2005 began on a Saturday
2006 began on a Sunday
2007 began on a Monday
2008, a leap year, began on Tuesday
2009 began on a Thursday
2010 began on a Friday
2011 began on a Saturday
2012, a leap year, began on a Sunday.
2013 began on a Tuesday
2014 began on a Wednesday.
2015 began on a Thursday.
2016, a leap year, will begin on a Friday.

Months

These are the 12 months in a year.

January has 31 days.
February has 28 days.
March has 31 days.
April has 30 days.
May has 31 days.
June has 30 days.
July has 31 days.
August has 31 days.
September has 30 days.
October has 31 days.
November has 30 days.
December has 31 days.

There are 7 months with 31 days. There are 4 months with 30 days. There is 1 month with 28 days. Every 4 years there is 29 days in February which is called a leap year. This happens because every year is 365 and 1/4 days but instead of us having a spare quarter of a day in each year we add them all up every 4 years and make an extra day to avoid confusion and make things easier for everyone.