The development of children’s cognitive and reasoning powers are largely dependent upon the usage of games, as described in the Jay Carty’s post. From the earliest years, children are given basic games, such as the one shown below, to help them learn how to reason through simple tasks, such as which blocks can fit into which holes. Although as adults these games seem simplistic in their nature, if it were possible to think as a toddler would, we would find this game as difficult as trying to carry on a conversation with a native speaker of Klingon (if one can find such a person). Without some form of device that could attract and keep the attention of the infant, trying to learn these skills would be next to impossible.
As Koster describes about this development “We see the statistics on…how many basic aspects of life they master—aspects that are frankly so subtle that we have even forgotten learning them—and we usually fail to appreciate what an amazing feat this is.” This reinforces the fact that without some communication-less form of reinforcement of these basic life skills that we develop at a young age, such as whether or not we can fit into a certain size of pants or whether or not we could really fit through a mouse hole, we would be forced to delay development until communication could be established with children, even though without some method of doing this, this development may never occur.