ABSTRACT
“For of the three elements in speechmaking—speaker, subject, and person addressed,” Aristotle said, “it is the last one, the hearer, that determines the speech’s end and object” (Aristotle, trans. 1991, 81p. 101). Applied to instructional communication, Aristotle’s admonition about the importance of “the hearer” suggests that it is the student who determines the end and object of a teacher’s lesson. Although contemporary research suggests an increase in active learning and “flipped classrooms” in which the students are actively engaged in the learning, instruction remains largely a teacher-led process of teachers talking to students (Flipped Classroom Trends, 2015). A rhetorical approach to instructional communication suggests that teachers use verbal and nonverbal messages with the intent to influence students to learn. As McCroskey and Richmond (1996) noted, “The function of rhetorical communication is to get others to do what you want or need them to do and/or think the way you want or need them to think—to persuade them” (p. 234). A key to influencing or persuading others is to understand the listener’s background and characteristics. Applied to instructional settings, a rhetorical approach to instructional communication includes a focus on students as the communication audience.
