The choice of a city is the first step. When teaching English as a second language in China, you may decide at the beginning that you prefer to teach about the United States rather than England. Comparing maps of Shanghai and the Los Angeles area sets off differences in the layout. Los Angeles offers many grids and few circular patterns except when urban development followed the natural layout of the terrain such as canyons, and steep hills. Streets provide many cultural insights through the width of streets and sidewalks, number of pedestrians, look and number of cars.
Interior decoration illustrates lifestyles.
An American kitchen usually displays a microwave oven and a toaster. The second step is the choice of an identity as a tenant in the building. Each of these hobbies gives an opportunity to describe very different places and the people who practice these activities, the way they dress, and interact. These are all opportunities to discover a different world, to communicate and use the target language, in this case, English, either in oral or written contexts. They constitute incentives that will motivate the students to find out more about each of these topics, to explore and learn the vocabulary to deal with them.