Have them suggest how people communicated before then. Then have them imagine themselves living at the time the first phones were installed. Let students choose a historical period in which there were many social and technological changes. Students can choose from among several periods, or you may prefer to choose a single period and have students immerse themselves in it. After they research the period, they are to create a profile of an individual who might have lived at that time and whose life would have been affected by those changes.
Students can present their profiles as either nonfiction or fiction.
A Day in the Life of a Factory Girl. Other possibilities are journal entries and letters. Students might write a script to show events in their character's life, then act it out before the class. If several students elect the same period to research, bring them together to role-play their characters in a social or work situation. They could also form a panel to discuss their different lifestyles and issues arising from those differences.