In the United States, May is the month of graduations and prom nights. Our son experienced all of this in preschool that year, and this article focused on the first part of that discovery: prom.

General information

Prom, or prom night, is a very important event for American teenagers and is just as famous as high school graduation. It takes place at the end of the school year for the oldest high school students, mainly seniors in 12th grade and juniors in 11th grade.

Students from the two younger grades can sometimes attend if they are invited and chaperoned by a senior or junior. For juniors and younger students, invitations depend on each school’s own rules.

Boys usually wear suits and girls wear long evening dresses with a flower on their wrist. For girls, the outfit is extremely important and almost has the significance of a first “big dress” event, somewhere between a gala and a preview of a wedding dress moment.

Students may go to prom as a couple, in which case the boy often invites the girl he likes a few weeks beforehand in a way that is often sweet, funny, or elaborate. It is all part of the ritual.

Our preschool mini-prom experience

Our son’s invitation was free, and for us parents the evening cost only two dollars. Everything was scaled down for young children, of course, but the spirit of the event was already there: dressing up, taking photos, dancing, and sharing a festive school moment.

It was a lovely family experience and another reminder of how present ceremonies are in American school life, even at a very young age. Two weeks later, it would already be time for the famous mini graduation ceremony.