Dating, Courting & Choosing a Mate... What Works? {Review}

This entry is part 5 of 24 in the series 2018 Homeschool Reviews

My daughter may only be 12 but I like to start thinking about her future life things well in advance. This was true for puberty and since she’s been asking me questions lately about my pre-marriage dating life, whether daddy and I “courted, and more I thought I’d better start figuring out how to talk to her about her own future plans. So yeah, I jumped at the chance to review Dating, Courting & Choosing a Mate… What Works? (Video) (for parents of kids ages 9-college) by Parenting Made Practical

Parenting Made Practical also creates several other products, some of which the Homeschool Review Crew is also reviewing.

Dating, Courting & Choosing a Mate… What Works? is a video and 2 book set that helps parents help their young adult children navigate the world of finding their life partner using Biblical philosophy. The goal is for the teen or young adult to really get to know the person they are dating or planning to marry before making a lifetime commitment. They call this Friendship Dating.

About the Video Package

We received the Dating, Courting & Choosing a Mate… What Works? and one of the small booklets which are 56 pages.

The DVD contains 2 sessions that are each close 60 minutes long (50 minutes and 58 minutes). And the booklet contains the same information as the video just in a print format that makes it easier to go through the steps and exercises.

The DVD sessions feature the authors, Joey and Carla Link, in a seminar type setting with a medium-sized audience. Joey Link is a former youth pastor and both he and his wife have worked in ministry for many years. Joey and Carla give lots of examples from their children’s lives and how the model worked for them.

Session 1 features a look at the popular courting method of the 90’s, what methods don’t work, and some stories from their own and the Link children’s lives. It also introduces their Friendship to Marriage Method which has Four Areas of Growth the couple go through. The four areas of growth are listed below.

Mental
Physical
Spiritual
Social

Session 2 is called Making it Work and lays out the guidelines for helping your child figure out if this guy or girl makes good marriage material, or is worth their time using the four areas of growth. Joey and Carla go through each of their Four Areas of Growth in more detail.

How Did I like Dating, Courting & Choosing a Mate… What Works?

Okay, I really like stuff like this. I watched this series on my own. I don’t want to freak my husband (or my daughter) out yet so he’ll watch it later (much later). Our daughter is still his baby girl so thinking of her and marriage in the same sentence.. even paragraph is too much right now.

I think this is a great method that my daughter can possibly use when the time comes.

Joey Link made a very valid point in Session 1 that dating and courtship belong to the couple, not the parents. How can you expect your child to manage their own homes and families if you held the reigns up to the wedding day? This model gives your young person tools to identify when they should look closer and when they might want to move on.

Joey and Carla point out how the modern day form of dating and picking your spouse doesn’t work very well for a Christian teen. And also how the very locked down method of courtship also doesn’t work.

They also share their family story of purity rings and how they used them with their children.

There are several other resources mentioned to use during the different phases of Friendship Dating.

I want to say my husband and I did Friendship Dating without knowing it but 20 years later who knows.

This series is also meant to be watched and read by young people of dating age and those thinking along the lines of marriage. It’s not just for the parents.

Joey and Carla have a lot of knowledge. not only on setting up a model of Friendship Dating that seems to work well, but also on the aspects of different personalities, some pitfalls young people can fall into, and how to keep Christ at the center when it comes to this important time in your life.

My daughter is very young and this is not a topic I want her to be focused on at this time but as questions arise (as they do) I want to have good answers for her. God blessed my husband and I to find each other. I don’t know what my daughter’s story will look like but I like to be prepared. This is a great product for worriers like me.