Abstract
This article aims to present the results of a diagnostic evaluation, used as a tool for collecting data on prior knowledge of scientific concepts needed to understand the topic „Earth and Universe‟, from a group comprised of 47 students of 6th grade. The educational method of diagnosing the student's prior knowledge before teaching them is founded on the Meaningful Learning theory, proposed by David Ausubel. The diagnostic evaluation consisted of 25 questions; the answers were analyzed and categorized, making possible their interpretation, which allows us to understand the meanings assigned by the student to these concepts. It follows from the diagnostic evaluation, that the majority of students surveyed had difficulties in exposing scientific concepts on the topic „Earth and Universe‟ when starting the 6th grade. However, we identified relevant ideas and representations that contributed to the re-signification of scientific concepts proposed for the teaching of the subject in this grade. The results of diagnostic evaluation served as reference to the organization of the syllabus, making possible the learning process by matching the sequence of teaching to the students‟ characteristics and context of the classroom. It is expected that other researchers in this topic can also use the instrument presented in this paper.
