Goal
Experience how constraints influence our decisions and encourage us to make more thoughtful, slower decisions.
Level of Difficulty:
Beginner to Intermediate
Participants:
2-person scenese
Instructions:
In pairs of two, get a single word suggestion from the broader group for a scene. Start a scene where the first person’s line starts with the letter A. The next person’s line starts with the letter B. Then C, and so on through the alphabet. The scene concludes with the letter Z.
For instance with a suggestion “apartment” the scene might unfold:
Apartment is ours!
Believe it or not, I knew we would be approved.
Could you be excited for me then?
Don’t you know how excited I am for both of us!
E…through…Y
Zoinks! We can’t move in
For Remote Teams
The biggest challenge for Alphabet Soup (other than words starting with letters X and Z) is remembering the alphabet. It’s not cheating to put the alphabet in the team chat as a reference. In fact, I highly encourage it. Here is the alphabet to copy and paste into your chat:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Practical Application:
How do constraints provide us opportunities for richer solutions? How do constraints encourage us to slow down and think through our solutions in more thoughtful ways?
While we may not design an interface following the alphabet, taxonomy and information hierarchy often follows an order. How might we identify these orders and build them into our systems in more meaningful ways?
See More Pattern-Games
- Peas in a Pod
- Sit, Stand, Lean
- Alphabet Soup (ABCs)
- 185 ___ Walk Into A Bar
- 2 Person, 3 Person
- No No No (a.k.a Well, Actually)
- Soundball
- Third Thought
- For Whom the Bell Tolls
- First Line Loop
Collaborative Improv 