What is school culture?

In 5th grade, we study culture. Students hunker down at their computers and in front of books, reading about what makes a civilizations different. We have a list of enduring understandings that we want the children to retain after a year of study. Therefore we do all sorts of activities that support their learning.

Here are the enduring understandings:

So we asked the question: what are some elements of our school culture? What are the traditions, values, ideas that make our school itself?

We had the kids make a long list of the elements. Then students chose which element they wanted to explore and find "evidence" for. They scurried around the school, snapping photographs of everything. When they returned to the classroom, their job was to upload the photographs onto a google site and write a caption for each one, explaining what that element says about the schools value. We wanted them to make the conceptual leap. . . if we collect pennies for people less fortunate, what does it say about what we find important? Though it may be obvious, we too often put children through the motion of experiences without making them reflect on what the value is. How often is our work in school valuable. More important, are we aware of the values that we are transferring??