Learning science in a meaningful way involves more than doing a series of activities directed towards anticipated outcomes. Learning science entails teacher and children talking together as "co-constructors" of knowledge (Barnes, 1976). Karen Gallas (1995) has described her long-term observations of the kinds of talk which contribute to a co-construction of knowledge in primary science classrooms. An essential feature of this talk is that children's ideas are taken seriously by everyone in the classroom. Sonia teaches a year 1 class in an urban bilingual (Arabic) school in the Western Canadian province of Alberta. English is a second language for a majority of the 28 6-year olds in the class. After reading Gallas's book during a graduate class, Sonia kept a journal of the patterns of talk in a short sequence of science lessons. In this way, she was able to "listen" in a different way, exploring the talk for its intentions and ideas, and asking questions such as "I wonder what he/she means here?" In this article, Sonia describes the talk in these lessons, and then offers a reflective commentary.