On the topic of individuals learning from games.
Check out Crazy Machines II
The question is: do children learn more from simulations because of the ability to rapid-prototype, or should they just hang out with some tools in the garage instead?
Simulations are fine, but what about the physical experience of actually using or building a machine? Wouldn’t a Lego Mindstorms or similar toy provide more hands-on / real learning than a computer simulation such as this?
My experience with Benjamin (4.75 yrs old) has been that he seems to get the concepts pretty quickly.