If the main reason to study literature is to explore ideas, some tools to teach ourselves to explore ideas may be helpful. We don't want to just jump on high school aged kids suddenly with the idea of discussing literature and ideas. This is something that reading aloud prepares them for all the way along in the homeschool career. It gets super fun and interesting at the high school level.

 The best tool I've found for preparing myself for discussion of ideas through literature is Teaching the Classics: a Socratic method for literary education published by the Center for Literary Education.  What I love about it:

• It's really accessible, everything I didn't remember about studying literature in high school was all there, in plain language and examples.

• It's based around discussion.

• It raises the love and awareness of literature without belabouring the student with writing assignments that may or may not be relevant to the love and understanding of literature.

• It can be used by the student on their own, easily or it's a great parent and child study tool, or a great read aloud to more than one child.

I read through this book years ago. Just to myself, as my children were getting older and I wanted our discussions of books we read together to be more relevant at their ages, while still addressing the historical and cultural context for the youngers. I've worked through it with a couple of my children one on one as a discussion tool, and have had some read it on their own. This year, with my 14, 11 and 8 year old (youngest has a high literary comprehension level, otherwise I probably wouldn't do it as an aloud), I'll be reading it out loud for five or ten minutes a day before our novel.

I believe it runs around 35$ for the workbook syllabus only, and their is a two day dvd course that goes with it. I've never watched the dvd, but I think we will this year, as I have heard from reliable sources that it, too, is excellent. The book, in my opinion, is priceless for literature lovers and non-literature lovers alike who need to cover the basics and more to study and understand literature.