While it may be nearly impossible to experience (rather than read) the process of scientific discovery in most cases, there are a few possibilities. The Pythagorean Theorem, for example, was probably the result of thousands of years of trying to find a general relationship between the diagonal and sides of rectangles. It is only now that we view it as the equivalent relationship between the legs and hypotenuses of right triangles. However, the people of ancient Iraq were most likely solving puzzles to determine the side of a square from its area by building the square on its diagonal and dissecting it in various ways. Eventually, this led to the triples they recorded in clay, but this was far from envisioning the modern version of the Pythagorean Theorem, which is a statement about lengths of sides of right triangles rather than areas of squares built from diagonals of rectangles. All of this to say that the rediscovery of the Pythagorean Theorem from trying to dissect and reassemble 2 square units, three, five, etc (and duplicates of those), into a single square, is not only a good way to improve spatial reasoning, but also maybe one way to experience scientific discovery as recreation without daunting investments of time and material.
While it may be nearly impossible to experience (rather than read) the process of scientific discovery in most cases, there are a few possibilities. The Pythagorean Theorem, for example, was probably the result of thousands of years of trying to find a general relationship between the diagonal and sides of rectangles. It is only now that we view it as the equivalent relationship between the legs and hypotenuses of right triangles. However, the people of ancient Iraq were most likely solving puzzles to determine the side of a square from its area by building the square on its diagonal and dissecting it in various ways. Eventually, this led to the triples they recorded in clay, but this was far from envisioning the modern version of the Pythagorean Theorem, which is a statement about lengths of sides of right triangles rather than areas of squares built from diagonals of rectangles. All of this to say that the rediscovery of the Pythagorean Theorem from trying to dissect and reassemble 2 square units, three, five, etc (and duplicates of those), into a single square, is not only a good way to improve spatial reasoning, but also maybe one way to experience scientific discovery as recreation without daunting investments of time and material.