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My kids are in 1st and 2nd grade. What would I need to order for them?

Have you looked at the placement chart? HOD isn't set up completely by grade level, as grade levels can have so many different meanings. Instead, the guides are set for suggested ages based on maturity mostly. For any one age, there are three (or more) guides to pick from. And what guide you pick depends a lot of narration and writing ability. Math you can customize to where they are, and the same is true for grammar, and reading/literature.

For a 1st and 2nd grader, I would look at Little Hearts for His Glory, Beyond Little Hearts, and Bigger Hearts. These three guides would be the ones that 1st and 2nd grade would fall in. Often, having the child in the middle age of a guide is recommended because of maturity (sitting still, subjects in the Bible studies, etc). If you find that they place into two different guides that are consecutive (like Little Hearts and Beyond OR Beyond and Bigger), you could go with the lower level guide for both children and then just customize the basics for the older child. Some families find that easier while others find having a guide per child easier.

If you look at the placement chart and post about where they fall, then you will get more help on what you specifically need, etc.

http://www.heartofdakota.com/placing-your-child.php

That's the link for the placement chart. You find which box best fits each child, the one with the "most" is probably the right choice.

I looked at the chart and it looks like they're in "Beyond Little Hearts" & "Bigger Hearts". I looked at the packages to order and I'm confused as to what to order.

So, the first thing to decide is if you want to do both guides for history, etc or just Beyond. There are pros and cons to this. From what I have read, it isn't hard to do two guides, but doing Bigger and Preparing at the same time can be a challenge (because they are teacher-intensive). If you choose to do both guides completely, here is what you would buy:

Beyond:
Economy Package (history and grammar/spelling)
Basic Package (science, math, Bible)
Deluxe Package (read-alouds - not necessary but a good way to work on narration and listening comprehension)
Reading - Pick one of the three. If your child places into the Emerging Readers and money is night, you can see how many of those books are at our local library, etc (mine has most of them)

Bigger:
Economy with Science (history, science, and spelling/dictation)
Basic Package (math, grammar, and Bible)
Reading - Pick one of the two. Again, library books are a great option for both Emerging Readers and DITHOR
Handwriting (one of two options)
Deluxe Package (read-alouds - similar to Beyond)

If you have any of those subjects already covered (math, language arts, etc), you can of course use those instead of what HOD offers.

If you choose to just do Beyond for history and science, you can then just buy the Basic Package for the 2nd grader in Bigger as well as the needed reading and possibly handwriting.

The other thing is if you are on the fence about some answers on the placement chart, go down to the lower level. The placement chart is where they should be at the beginning of the guide. It slowly builds throughout the year.

If your children placed in Beyond and Bigger, I would combine them into Beyond and do math, language arts (grammar and spelling), and reading on their level.

I agree that if they place in bigger and Beyond, I would combine them for everything but phonics/reading and math. They will do well, and it will be a great way to start your homeschooling journey.

If you are new to Heart of Dakota, then you will probably find it easiest to do Beyond Little Hearts with both of them. This covers History, Bible study, Spelling, Poetry, Copywork, and Storytime, and has a Rotating activity that covers Art, Science, Geography, and Timeline. There is definitely enough interesting stuff and challenge in those areas to even hit a 2nd grader pretty well. If your 2nd grader is ready for cursive, then I highly recommend Cheerful Cursive which HOD uses for the Bigger Hearts program. If your 2nd grader is ready for daily grammar then you could get the Rod & Staff 2 program used in Bigger Hearts and just have the 2nd grader do 2 pages in that book every day (you should sit with them and read and help guide them, check answers, if you want the teacher's guide that might be helpful too but we did it without the teacher's guide and it was fine). You would choose a reading program and math program that fits each child's level and those things do not connect with the History, it is whatever pace you want to do they just recommend doing each of those daily.

Beyond Little Hearts has a math program written in, if you buy the Singapore Math 1A and 1B workbooks there is a plan for hands-on activities and how many pages to do each day. If your child is more at the Singapore 2A/2B level (Singapore has a placement test on their website that can help you determine this) there is a schedule in the back of Beyond for 2A/2B but no activities, so if you are strong in math you may just work with the child yourself, or if you are not you may want the textbooks for additional exercises and teaching aid, or the Home Instructor's Guide from Singapore.

Beyond Little Hearts also has the Emerging Reader schedule. They sell the book pack so you could own all of these reading books, or as Stephanie mentioned, many of them will be at your local library. The schedule though steps you through each book and has comprehension questions you discuss each day. The Bibles you start off Emerging Readers with you would probably have to buy. Emerging Reader is for students who have mastered most phonics and can read relatively fluently things like Step 2 or Step 3 books. It takes them from early reader into a reader ready for short chapter books.

If you can afford to and want to own the books here is what you would buy:
Beyond Little Hearts Economy Package
Beyond Basic Package (includes math workbooks)
One of the storytime sets (deluxe package) (these are books you read aloud for storytime where you will talk about the genre, story elements, and practice narration skills)
The Emerging Reader books if either of them is an Emerging Reader
A phonics book or program, or if your 2nd grader is ready for chapter books and literature study then there's Drawn Into the Heart of Reading which has its own page and a bunch of things to think through with that.

Additional math workbooks for the 2nd child
Cheerful Cursive if your older one is ready for Cursive (look in Bigger Hearts packages it is there)
Rod & Staff 2 if your older one is ready for daily grammar

If finances are an issue then a lot of the Emerging Reader set and Storytime books can probably be gotten at your library but I will say I did that for Beyond one time and I found it a hassle to try to make sure I had the books when I wanted and for as long as I wanted. If someone else requested the book, then I had to return it. But I live in a small-ish town so our library is not very big and many of the books there is only 1 copy.

I hope this helps!

I just wanted to add in (in addition to MelinKansas) that to start out, I would also do only Beyond with both of them to begin with - at least until you get into the grove of things. I have a 1st grader and a 2nd grader and they both doing Beyond right now together. They LOVE it.

Also - when this program was created, the person who created it wrote the first 3 levels for 5 days a week of school. However, she only does school 4 days a week. So it takes her 1 1/3 years to complete each of the first three levels. So Little would have started in K and then be used into 1st grade a bit. Then you would start Beyond about a third of they way into 1st grade and then finish it up about two thirds of the way through 2nd grade. And finally, you would start Bigger toward last third of 2nd grade and be finished with it by the end of 3rd grade. When you get to Preparing the schedule changes and is written to 4 days a week and is to be completed over one year (if you choose - some people take longer because they want to).

As for the grades that are listed for each levels. It seems to me as I did my research, that if you have never done HOD before, that you may not really want to chose the highest level based off the grade. For example, my oldest is in 4th grade. We chose Preparing for her. Even though it is written for a 3rd or 4th grade level, IMHO - it is a LOT of work for 3rd grader to do - especially if they aren't really ready for it. However, it also says that is written for an 8 - 10 year old child. I agree. My oldest is in 4th grade but she just turned 9 a few weeks ago. It was a perfect fit for her. She met all the criteria listed the placement chart. And I only used the age and grade to then look at their skills and pick a level based on that.

But what I was going to say is that even if your child is ready for Bigger, since he or she is in 2nd grade, I would probably just have that child do a few months in Beyond with the younger child. This will get him or her even more ready for Bigger. HOD is a very different type of curriculum and program than other vendors. It teaches kids to look at things differently and has them start building these skills young. The skills learned every year in each level build upon the prior years learned skills. So with your kids, you could easily have them start together and the split them up in a few months if you wanted too.

I am having that dilemma myself about splitting my kids too. My 2 youngers are similar in a lot of ways but also are becoming more and more different. As my middle child (the 2nd grader) gets closer to Christmas, I now feel like he is showing me that he ready to be bumped to Bigger (which I won't bump him until at the earliest Spring.) HOD has children with their younger levels dictate sentences to you, you write it on a board or paper and they then copy what you write. Well, he is not wanting to copy me, but to try and write it alone. And he does a great job at it so I have been baby stepping here. I let him write it but I also write it and he has to check his work with what I wrote when he is finished. Also, in Beyond, it will say write one sentence about this. Well, he is wanting to write 2 or 3. So he is really showing signs that he can and wants to do more. Where as my younger child, Beyond is absolutely perfect fit for her and she is placed right where she should be. It isn't too challenging but it isn't to easy either. Honestly - I love having my 2 younger kids together (more than I thought I would) and I may keep them together for the rest of this year and for all of next year. It is so tough for me because I choose HOD so that each child could be on their own and do their own level. But others have choose HOD because they could combine similarly aged/leveled children together.

If you do find though that you want them together, I would definitely just go with Beyond only. You will find that every level up in HOD is more difficult. And that there is nothing worse than having a younger child struggle to keep up because they are not ready for that higher level. Not only is the actual work more difficult, but it also increases in volume significantly from Beyond to Bigger (and every level up as well).

Good luck with your decision and praying for peach and wisdom as you make it.