The title of this article may have come off a little harsh. You're a professional at designing instruction, and we're sure your work is *chef's kiss*, grade-A, awesome. However, if you've been relying on facilitation, text, images, and videos to design an engaging learning experience, we have a new method you will want to check out.
Meet: Procedural Rhetoric
Procedural Rhetoric, a term coined by Dr. Ian Bogost, is the "art of persuasion through rule-based representations and interactions rather than the spoken word, writing, images, or [videos]" (Bogost, 2010). Procedural rhetoric is a self-realization approach to learning. Instead of handing the learner all the answers to solve a problem, place them in a position to uncover new information, form different behaviors, and build new thought patterns as they explore the training environment.
"Procedural Rhetoric is the art of persuasion through rule-based representations and interactions rather than the spoken word, writing, images, or [videos]"
-Dr. Ian Bogost
We recommend leveraging the power of procedural rhetoric during the acceptance phase of behavior change. You must answer four questions to build a learning experience using procedural rhetoric. Here's how it's done:
1. What are the rules of the system?
Procedural rhetoric is about using rules to create an experience that persuades, teaches, or trains the learner to accept best practices that align with your organization's goals. During the experience, the learner succeeds (or fails) by making sequential decisions that affect the environment, characters, and objects according to the rules you establish. Dr. Bogost (2010) illustrates procedural rhetoric through the lens of videogames; however, he acknowledges that procedural rhetoric can be used in various media types--think eLearning.
Identify what performance improvement you want to make
Getting clear about the performance improvement impact you make will ensure your learning experience solves organizational problems. To create this experience, you will need to understand what real-world behavior change or new thought process the learner needs to adopt. This will be the goal or objective of your experience and is usually determined in collaboration with project stakeholders and leadership.
Understand the larger system that this behavior operates in
Great. Now that you know what behaviors or thought processes you need the learner to accept, adopt, and apply, consider how these behaviors or thoughts operate in the learner's day-to-day experience. What cues should the learner hone into to make them aware that it is time to execute this best practice? What external triggers come before the performance event, and what domino effect follows? Use these questions to construct a training environment that positions the learner to mimic the procedures they experience in their roles.
What do progressive and regressive behaviors look like?
When you design an experience with procedural rhetoric, you have to give the learner the chance to succeed or fail. Not only does this make the experience more realistic, but you can leverage the Law of Effect to motivate or discourage certain behaviors.
Take a moment to map out the potential actions the learner may take to overcome the environment's challenges. Which behaviors will you reward with positive reinforcement, and which will prevent the learner from progressing or, worse, receiving negative reinforcement?
2. What is the significance of these rules (over other rules)?
Performance derives from rules. Whether employees decide to follow your rules or their own, their actions are guided by what they accept to be appropriate in a particular situation. So, how do you convince them to follow your lead and change their behavior accordingly? Tap into their "why."
This isn't new news. As Simon Sinek says: "start with why" and build out the rest from there. Just be sure the "why" centers around the learner, not stakeholders or leadership. Help the learner understand why best practices are in their best interest by integrating rewards into the experience. Also integrate consequences to help the learner understand how alternative methods may seem appealing at first but can lead to potential risks down the line.
3. What claims about the world do these rules make?
When you build a learning experience using procedural rhetoric, you are essentially making claims about the material world and how it operates. By creating an experience that congratulates particular decisions and punishes others, you help the learner to understand how their choices stack up to one final result and the benefits and consequences of applying best practices. Here's a few examples of claims you can make when designing with Procedural Rhetoric:
If you follow this procedure, you will:
Mitigate liability
Save money
Make money
Create a better workplace environment
4. How do I want the learner to respond to these claims?
Procedural Rhetoric is not just about dumping a ton of information in front of the learner in hopes that they will retain it and apply it to their jobs; it's about empowering the learner to uncover this information through self-realization.
Now, you can get really deep with Procedural Rhetoric, so we recommend checking out Dr. Ian Bogost's book: Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Video Games. Are you interested in learning more about how to apply theories such as procedural rhetoric to your learning experiences? Tell us more about your upcoming project. We are happy to help.
References:
Bogost, I. (2010). Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames (The MIT Press) [E-book]. The MIT Press.
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