Review: Tractor Ted All About Tractors and Christmas Activity book

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, N is a serious Tractor Ted fan.  I blame Aunt number 1 for getting him his first DVD, Aunt number 2 for getting him a Tractor Ted waterproofs set last Christmas, and obviously me for then buying more DVDs!  When I heard that there was a new DVD and activity book out in time for Christmas, we were excited to be able to review them.

All About Tractors dvd

Tractor Ted is the longest programme N will sit and watch, he loves the focus on different aspects of farming (previous favourite was All About Horses, but this one has replaced that!) and even after only 1 viewing, he’s already repeating the commentary, and talking along with the Tractor Ted’s narration.

All Tractor Ted dvds fulfil the Early Years Foundation Stage requirements, so it’s good for me to know that it’s educational as well as just being a show he enjoys watching.  My mum and brother came to tea the other day, and had to sit through a viewing of it as well; they were surprised at it being a documentary, rather than a cartoon style children’s programme that they’d expected.

All About Tractors takes you through the tractor factory as tractors are built (N asks his favourite question ‘what’s that?’ lots during this bit), shows what happens with slurry (delightful but interesting to pre-schoolers who like mud and muck!), and finishing off with the Christmassy visit to see reindeer where the children look after them and get to ride on the sleigh.  Perfect to get you in the Christmas frame of mind.

As per usual N got really absorbed when watching the DVD.  He likes to choose which of his Tractor Ted dvds he wants to watch, but at the moment, this is the one winning out every time.  He’d have preferred to see John Deere tractors rather than New Holland’s like his uncle’s but really, any tractors work for him.

Tractor Ted’s Christmas Activity book

N has access to a couple of older Tractor Ted Activity books, although doing the activities is a bit too old for him.  He does enjoy looking at the pictures and talking about what’s in them, relating them to what we have on the farm or what he’s seen, so we do our own activities.  My theory is just talking about what you see will help children learn.

This book has the usual activities of learning opposites (like up and down, large, small), counting, tracing the letters, colouring in pages, odd ones out etc.  I like that the pictures are generally photos of real farming things (whether animals or vehicles) rather than graphics which are harder for young children to recognise.

The animals featured are much more Christmassy, so turkeys, reindeer and so on.  I think it’ll be great to read this around Christmas when N might be getting closer to following proper activity instructions rather than doing his own thing.

N’s dad isn’t a keen reader unless it involves agriculture, but with the Tractor Ted activity books, N can look at these with his dad, as well as with his Gran and Gramp over at the farm.

If you’ve got a tractor lover I don’t think you can go wrong with any of the Tractor Ted dvds or activity books, which you can buy at the Tractorland website.

P.S. My advice is to keep the dvds out of reach of little hands as N insists on getting them out of the cases himself and putting them in the dvd player – we get through lots from him smearing or scratching them.

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Disclosure: We received a copy of the All About Tractors dvd and Christmas Activity book to review.  All opinions are our own.