This paper reports on the successful redesign of a graduate course based on threshold concepts that emerged from a recent study of search expertise (reported on at the Fifth Biennial Threshold Concepts Conference (Tucker, 2014)). The course focus of search expertise is of significant interest in higher education as this domain has cross-disciplinary consequence: critical concepts connected to expert like search behaviors are relevant to any academic field or subject.

In redesigning the course, a primary objective was to be deliberate in creating opportunities for students to wrestle with concepts. I developed assignments and activities designed for “more making of space for discovery moments and for students to experience—and get to know—unknowing and uncertainty” (Tucker, 2016, p. 13). Threshold concepts were used to guide course design and content. My role, as educator-researcher, was to help students move forward toward and through troublesome and transformative learning, serving as “temporary guide” (Higgs & Cronin, 2013, p. 163). Indeed, another primary objective was to ensure my own transience in my educator role, as this can be “one measure of the integrative nature of a threshold experience for the student” (Tucker, 2016, p. 12). The redesigned course is evaluated using student discussion posts as the main dataset of qualitative evidence. The course has online discussion forums and students are asked in the final weeks to answer questions about key take-aways and their reflections on critical concepts learned. A second dataset is from a quantitative survey distributed at semester’s end.

Participants in this conference paper session may expect these take-aways: ways to structure a course to create opportunities for students to experience liminal learning experiences; ways to raise student awareness of existing perspectives; activities for reflective practice in learning; discussion of how course redesign of this type can impact the educator.