The use of representations in evidence-based and non-evidence-based physics activities

Representations such as graphs, pictures, words, and equations play a crucial role in the pedagogy of introductory physics. Activities such as labs and tutorials often require students to analyze and produce these representations. We investigate the use of representations in a variety of activities. Specifically, we examine both labs and tutorials as well as both evidence-based and non-evidence-based activities. We define evidence-based activities as those that have been connected with positive learning outcomes in published research articles. Our evidenced-based activities are inspired by physics education research, while our non-evidence-based activities are more traditional. We compare and contrast the use of representations among these types of activities. We investigate several uses of representations, including representations produced by the student; representations provided by the activity; and representations that the student re-examines at a later point in the activity.