Upgrading the Afternoon Basket...

Our use of our Afternoon Basket seems to be waning a bit lately--it feels almost a bit stale since we've been focusing much of it outside the range I wanted to focus on this year (i.e. too many add-ons to history and science, not enough good literature).

I have plans now to refresh it, to change it up a bit to more closely align with what I am trying to impart to the kids, and to simplify. I want to rotate books through it a little better as well, so with that said, here is what I am thinking:

Sundays
Geographical explorations with Richard Halliburton's Complete Book of Marvels

Mondays
Shakespeare with Tales From Shakespeare (I have a bit more time for everything on Mondays, and these stories are a little on the longer side, and more complex)

Tuesdays
Nature reading, which for now will be My Life with the Chimpanzees

Wednesdays
Fairy tales -- we're reading through The Scottish Fairy Tale Book at the moment

Thursdays
Poetry with The Barefoot Book of Classic Poems and (because we have more time on Thusdays) Greek mythology with Hawthorne's A Wonder Book for Boys & Girls in preparation for next fall's lit studies.

So, each day we'll start with a reading from the Afternoon Basket, and then we'll move into our basics studies, then read about history, finish off basics, and wrap it all up with science:

History: Sundays - a chapter from K12's Human Odyssey; Monday through Thursday - a chapter from a good book or a short story to go with our current historical focus

Science:
Monday - reading from You Are the Earth; Tuesday - a secondary reading to go with Monday, or an appropriate documentary; Wednesday - reading from Dr. Art's Guide to Science; Thursday - supplemental reading for Wednesday's work and a hands-on project to go with one or the other of our main source books.After doing some soul searching and reading of old threads (homeschool forum), I think we're going to take a break from formal science to do some simple nature studies and gardening. I have The Handbook of Nature Study, and we can continue watching the Life series. Additionally, I really want to do the bean sprouting project! We may still do some reading from You Are the Earth since the next chapter is about soil, and has a good sprouting project as well, OR we may read a chapter each day from The Storybook of Science, since we never finished it, but I think we'll skip the rest of what I had listed above for now.

Enjoy your weekend!