The micro/macro is not referring to the size of any changes.
Yup.
My understanding is that there is a recognition that to cross the species boundary requires something more than just the gradual steps.
Not really, speciation requires nothing more than gradual steps (although this point was debated quite heavily in the past, the consensus view now is that: no, it doesn't), but macro does cover factors which are not evident or relevant on the micro-scale: e.g. the founder Effect, geographic speciation, niche seperation, etc.
Still, it's pretty much fallen into disuse; we're taught it as a "this was how it used to be divided - it wasn't found to be useful but you may still see it kicking around" kind of thing.