SANRC FYE Presentations 2018

Criticism of Threshold Concepts

■ Definitional issues

–

how a TC can be identified empirically?

–

are some characteristics more important than others?

■ Inconsistency in nomenclature

–

‘threshold concepts framework’, ‘thresholds framework’,

‘thresholds approach’, ‘thresholds theory’ etc.

■ Methodological issues

–

lack of empirical evidence

■ Agent-dependence

–

i.e. what is transformative for one student may not be for

another

■ Teacher/student perceptions

–

TC relates to who identifies it