This work aimed to identify the cognitive skillsdeveloped bythe students of a 6th grade elementary school class of a private school in the interior of the State of São Paulo from the study of the freezing of the water surface of lakes. For this, the methodological strategy chosen consisted in the launching of problematizing questions by the teacher throughout the entire investigative process. The results demonstrated that there was an increasing movement of the cognitive levels presented in the students' responses. Initially, they started from established situations and, in the end, elaborated more complete answers, seeking to rescue the concepts and the discussions in order to improve their explanations. In this sense, it should be emphasized that the teaching and learning process through high-order cognitive skills is desirable, but the teaching strategies and evaluation methods chosen by the teacher need to be aligned for this purpose.