Calendar - History of Calendar

We use a calendar every day. A calendar is made up of pages that show the months of the year and the days of the week. The calendar we use today has 12 months-January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December.

We use a calendar today to keep us on schedule. But at one time, there was no calendar! In ancient times, people used the sun, moon, and the stars to keep track of time. The first "calendar" was the Julian calendar. It was created in 46 B.C. It is called "Julian" because Julius Caesar was the emperor of Rome.

Pope Gregory XIII invented the calendar we use today in 1582. This is the calendar that has 12 months and 365 cays. A year is the time it takes the earth to travel around the sun one time. So, a year is 365 and 1/4 days. But, how do we have 1/4 of a day? Every 4 years, there is an extra day in the month of February. February normally has 28 days, but every 4 years, there are 29 days. This is called a "leap year."

How many days do the other months have? September, November, April, and June have 30 days. The others-January March, May, July, August, October, and December-have 31 days.

The calendar also shows weeks and days. The weeks in the calendar start on Sunday and go to Saturday. There are 7 days in each week. Even though Sunday is the first day of the week in the calendar, we usually call Saturday and Sunday the "weekend." This is because the work week is from Monday to Friday.

Today, some people use a paper calendar and others have electronic calendars on their computers or phone. Calendars are used to keep schedules and to remind us of important holidays.