Inventory for the assessment of representational competence of vector fields

Representational competence is essential for the acquisition of conceptual understanding in physics. It enables interpretation diagrams, graphs, and mathematical equations, relating these to one another as well observations experimental outcomes. In this study, we present initial validation a newly developed cross-contextual assessment students’ representing vector-field plots field lines, most common visualization concept vector fields. The Competence Fields Inventory (RCFI) consists ten single choice items two that each contain three true or false questions. tool can be easily implemented within an online assessment. assesses conventions interpreting lines plots, translation between these. intended use both scale representational competences respect representations fields reveal related misconceptions (areas difficulty). was administered at German-speaking universities Switzerland Germany total 515 first- third-semester students from science, technology, engineering, mathematics subjects. first steps RCFI, evaluated its psychometric quality via classical test theory combination with Rasch scaling examined construct validity by conducting student interviews. RCFI exhibits good internal consistency ?=0.86, results analysis revealed discriminate among lower medium-high levels. several misunderstandings shortcomings, such confusion plots. Moreover, it showed many believed must not exhibit curvature, lengths matter, may have sharp corners. current version, allows assessing interpret representations, necessary prerequisite learning widespread We report on planned future adaptations tool, optimizing some distractors.8 MoreReceived 11 February 2021Accepted 24 August 2021DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevPhysEducRes.17.020126Published American Physical Society under terms Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution work maintain attribution author(s) published article’s title, journal citation, DOI.Published SocietyPhysics Subject Headings (PhySH)Research AreasAssessmentPhysics Education Research