With a research perspective focused on software teaching and learning, we are interested in studying the skills deployed by young software users. What knowledge do they mobilize ? Do they have a deep understanding of the concepts of the software ? Which are the difficulties they face ? To assess skills in the use of software tools, we need to consider in our methodology both the fi nal production and the process. The software considered in this research is spreadsheet. Facing some difficulties to correctly interpret users’ behaviour, we found useful to take into account their own explanation on the process they followed. We found that interviews, inspired by elicitation techniques, may capture verbalization on activities and provide data about the motivation of actions. Based on a new study concerning 3 students in higher education, this article focuses on the contribution of their interviews in the analysis of their spreadsheet skills.