Crossing the Threshold in Introductory Women’s and Gender Studies Courses: An Assessment of Student Learning

Abstract

This article reports on a scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) project in the introductory women’s and gender studies course, occasioned by a curricular redesign to focus the course on four threshold concepts within the field: the social construction of gender, privilege and oppression, intersectionality, and feminist praxis. The authors identify the metaphors students used to describe their learning, focus on the roles of metacognitive development and affective learning, and discuss the most difficult course concept for students: intersectionality.