It is common practice in elementary science classrooms to have students create representations, such as drawings, as a way of exploring new content. While numerous studies suggest the benefits of representation in science, the majority focus on specific, canonical representations, such as graphs. Few offer insight or guidance regarding how teachers might effectively incorporate ad hoc, non-normative student-generated representations in their curricula. This study addresses this gap by detailing the relationship between two designed activities--one that supported more open-ended engagement with referents and the other that promoted a synthesis of referents--and the representational products that students generated as a result. We present data from a mixed age classroom (ages 6-9, N?=?32) as students depicted their understanding of loggerhead sea turtles. Findings indicate that students performed better when working alone in the open condition and in collaborative dyads in the synthesize condition. These results suggest that it is necessary to unpack how mediating factors (such as students' cooperative strategies, facilitator feedback and materials used) align, to support or inhibit students' representational activities.