Saturday, May 16, 2009

Prom Preparation

Prom preparation at San Juan Bautista is in full swing. Next Thursday we will be holding prom. Out of a possible 300 students, 212 have bought tickets! I am really happy with the turn out considering about a month ago my students had never heard about prom. In order to get the school excited for prom, Jim and I gave “All About Prom” presentations to all the English classes. Some of the serious questions the students asked were whether beer would be served at the prom (the drinking age is 18 and the students are 15, 16, and 17 years old), how short could the dresses be, do I have to have a date, and why is the prom on a Thursday. I responded to the students no alcohol would be served at the dance, your dress does not need to be ankle length but must adequately cover your body while you are dancing, you do not need a date, and Rosa, principal of the school, chose the date because she didn’t think teachers would come if it were on a weekend.
This past week we have voted on the prom court and king and queen. When asked what the criteria was, the first thing that came to mind was popularity. Clearly, this is not the message we wanted to send, so Jim and I decided to tell the students it was based on leadership, dedication to the school, and someone who you would want to represent the school. After the prom king and queen are announced, the king and queen will share one dance. We asked the court to select a slow song, and get this they picked the Titanic song (My Heart will go on by Celine Dion). I truly feel like I am back in middle school reliving the awkward school dances. I am expecting a lot of cologne from the boys, girls going to the bathroom every five minutes to fix their makeup, awkward slow dances, and tons of laughs.
The prom will be held this Thursday, from 7 – 10 pm in the outside patio of the school. One thing we did not take into account is that it is going to be light out the entire dance. I guess that means the dancing will be a little tamer. Another only in Spain thing is that the students are going to go home and eat dinner after the dance. We are serving snacks but only in Spain can you get away without serving dinner for an event scheduled from 7-10 pm. I am keeping my fingers crossed that the weather stays nice and we do not have any rain otherwise the dance will be moved inside.

1 comment:

Emily said...

Oh my goodness, Michelle, how funny! Sounds like it will be a lot of fun. Can't wait to hear how it goes!