its different in every state dude, in washington, for example, you go through a series of preliminary motions (to dismiss) and if any of your lame ass excuses (motions) hold up, then its dismissed. If not, you can defer, plead guilty or not. sometimes, if they have all their shit together you'll just do your little mini trial right there, swear in, tell your story and thats that.
U got a ticket in montana once, there's no dollar amount on the ticket, just a court date. So i go in, and first things first i have to plead guilty or not guilty. So I say, guilty- with circumstances. And he's like well what are they. And I was like well I've only been in this town a few days, its an extremely weird stop sign that i ran etc etc. and he was like alright.. well thats too bad. so anyway, the point is, everyone does it differently.