The night is dark and full of neons (lesson plan for +18)

You may not be familiar with a Polish national treasure a.k.a. CD Projekt RED, you may not even realise massive hype connected with probably the most expected game since Red Dead Redemption 2 (at least for some), but you must have heard of two names that have been coming up in trending on the internet for the past ten days – Keanu Reeves and Cyberpunk 2077.

It is not very often that I share something exclusively for adults, but this topic is more appropriate for mature learners, as it includes violence, politics and, to put it bluntly, life experience. The aim of the lesson is to make people talk and exchange their views, and as a teacher one needs to be aware of controversies of various topics, so pay attention to moderate the discussion. Also, the best level for this lesson is B1+ and above.

The whole lesson is about two important things – our future and the importance of stories, and how they blend. The base for the lesson is presentation of Cyberpunk 2077 with Keanu Reeves at Microsoft Xbox show at E3 2019. The video is quite long, but you will watch it in two parts.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwgrsjHlqas&w=560&h=315]

Warm-up

Greet your students and explain the aim of the lesson: discussing our reality with regards to a certain literary genre, namely cyberpunk. Ask them whether they have ever heard this expression, and try to narrow down the narrative of cyberpunk (you will find a nice article on cyberpunk on wikipedia). There are chances your students are familiar with the classics, such as Blade Runner, Akira, Matrix, Altered Carbon or the works of Philip K. Dick, William Gibson or Pat Cadigan.

You will watch a recent trailer for Cyberpunk 2077, a game by CD Project RED, to get the whiff of a cyberpunk world.

Part 1

Watch the video up to 3:53 which where the actual game trailer starts.

Apart from obvious questions referring to the story, its main protagonist, the plot, the possible outcome, encourage students to focus on the background. The omnipresent technology and something that is the core of the genre – body cybermodification. You may discuss the role of technology in our lives ever since we were born – it may be a great discussion if your group consists of both digital immigrants and digital natives.

If you know your group enjoys slightly more controversial topics, you may discuss the idea of body modification – a great example may be a story of Viktoria Modesta (you may read an article about her here). She’s turned her leg prosthetic into a work of art, but the controversial aspect is that the leg amputation was not something absolutely necessary – it was Viktoria herself who simply wanted to use artistic prosthetic.

Part 2

Once you finish discussing the genre and the story, and how far we are from living in the actual cyberpunk – or if we ever live there (answers may vary), you may watch a part where Keanu Reeves appears on stage to share the date of game release, but is welcomed with a thunderous applause, especially when he says I am always drawn to fascinating stories.

Have you ever tried storytelling in your classroom, engaging your students into spinning a tale? You may use various games that will help you – Once Upon a Time or simple Story Cubes may turn out to be great beginnings of fascinating tales. Introducing Role Playing Games is the best way to engage everyone in a story – but be sure to discuss why stories matter. At first your students may claim only children like stories, but we already know we are surrounded by stories from birth to death (you can watch some TED talks on the topic).

Ask your students to recall their favourite story and let them explain why they liked it so much. That will make your students open up a bit, and surprisingly other students will probably be happy to listen. That’s the magic of stories – we’re not eager to listen what happened during the previous week, but we’re more attentive when we expect a good story.

Homework

Homework is a conclusion to the lesson, and it requires some time, reflection and revision. Ask your students to write a short story, similar to their favourite tale, only set in a cyberpunk world. I’m fairly sure the results will be amazing.

Enjoy!