8 Creative Ways to Teach SDG 9 - Infrastructure, Industrialization and Innovation - in Your Classroom

Industry, innovation, and infrastructure are at the core of Sustainable Development Goal 9 (SDG 9). This goal emphasizes the importance of building sustainable infrastructure, encouraging innovation in education, and supporting inclusive industrial growth. It's a future-focused SDG that empowers students to think critically and creatively about real-world problems and their solutions.

For teachers looking to integrate SDG 9 into the classroom, this opens the door to dynamic STEM challenges, entrepreneurship projects, digital lessons, and discussions on sustainable technology. It’s the perfect opportunity to connect your curriculum to global goals and inspire the next generation of changemakers.

In this post, you'll discover 8 free digital classroom activities using BookWidgets that make SDG 9 engaging and accessible for students of all levels. These interactive lesson ideas will help your learners explore the principles of innovation, sustainability, and infrastructure development while building future-ready skills.

Let’s dive in and empower students to become creative problem-solvers through SDG 9

The digital SDG 9 activities are created with BookWidgets, a content creation and student learning evaluation tool for teachers. You can make a free copy of the lessons below to your BookWidgets account, or you can navigate to this BookWidgets group folder where you can find them all together.You can duplicate the activities, make changes (such as language, instructions, or settings) as needed, and share them with your students. ** When your students complete the activities, you will also receive the results and be able to provide feedback.

Make sure to check out more SDG resources below, and stay tuned as we release a new blog post with ready-to-use SDG lessons every month!

What is SDG 9: Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure?

Sustainable Development Goal 9 (SDG 9) focuses on Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure. It aims to build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization, and foster innovation. SDG 9 acknowledges that robust infrastructure and forward-thinking innovation are crucial for economic growth, environmental sustainability, and social development.

From clean transport systems and renewable energy to digital access and sustainable production, SDG 9 empowers young people to think like engineers, inventors, designers, and critical thinkers. It challenges them to explore how science, technology, and creativity can help solve real-world problems.

Why should teachers include SDG 9 in their lessons?

Integrating SDG 9 into your teaching doesn’t just meet curriculum standards—it prepares students for the future. Here's why educators should include SDG 9 in the classroom:

• Encourages problem-solving and innovation: Students learn to identify global challenges and develop creative solutions using technology, design, or science.
• Supports STEM and cross-curricular learning: SDG 9 blends perfectly with subjects like science, engineering, geography, ICT, and even art and economics.
  
• Promotes sustainability and global awareness: Lessons on infrastructure and innovation naturally lead to conversations about climate action, social equity, and sustainable living.
• Inspires future careers: Introducing students to concepts like green technology, sustainable architecture, and digital infrastructure can spark interest in future-ready careers.
  
• Connects classroom learning to global goals: When students understand how their education ties into the UN Sustainable Development Goals, they feel more motivated and empowered to make a difference.
  

Review this checklist, which outlines all the target goals for SDG 9.

9 Free and Interactive Lesson Plans to Teach SDG 9 – Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure

1. Inventions Timeline - Timeline Widget

Teaching about inventions through history is a powerful way to explore Sustainable Development Goal 9 (SDG 9), which focuses on building resilient infrastructure, promoting inclusive and sustainable industrialization, and fostering innovation.

By studying key historical inventions, your students gain a deeper understanding of how technology has evolved and continues to shape the modern world. Inventions such as the steam engine, the electric light bulb, and the internet have revolutionized infrastructure, transformed industries, and laid the foundation for today’s innovation-driven society. This directly supports the learning goals of SDG 9 in education.

Incorporating SDG 9 classroom activities, like a digital timeline of inventions, helps students visualize the timeline of progress and appreciate how innovation fuels sustainable development. In the final task of this activity, students are asked to think critically and propose a new invention that could contribute to sustainable infrastructure or inclusive industrialization, connecting past breakthroughs with future possibilities.

2. Innovations Powering Sustainable Infrastructure - Flashcards

Teaching students about major innovations that have shaped our modern world is a perfect way to connect your curriculum to Sustainable Development Goal 9 (SDG 9), which focuses on building resilient infrastructure, promoting sustainable industrialization, and fostering innovation. With this engaging Flashcards activity, your students can explore 12 essential inventions and their roles in sustainable development.

Each flashcard introduces a real-world innovation, such as solar panels, bullet trains, or 3D printing, and pairs it with a simple, student-friendly explanation. Students swipe through the cards, test their memory, and learn how each invention has contributed to shaping more inclusive and efficient infrastructure or industry. You can also use the Flashcards to spark a conversation about why the biggest benefits of these innovations are for the community.

3. Innovations Powering Sustainable Infrastructure - Crossword

After exploring modern innovations with flashcards, your students are now ready to apply that knowledge in a more engaging and critical-thinking activity: a crossword puzzle focused on SDG 9 technologies. This is a seamless follow-up that reinforces key vocabulary, deepens conceptual understanding, and sparks meaningful classroom discussions.

This crossword puzzle introduces students to 11 real-world innovations that support sustainable infrastructure, industry, and innovation—the essence of Sustainable Development Goal 9. Each clue describes a technology or method actively contributing to a more resilient and sustainable future.

💡 Tip for teachers: After completing the puzzle, encourage students to select one innovation and write a short reflection or create a visual explaining how it could be used to improve infrastructure in their own community.

This activity supports vocabulary building, reading comprehension, and systems thinking—all essential skills for understanding and contributing to sustainable development.

4. The Boston Tea Party - Split Worksheet

In this story from Naratopia, Elizabeth’s exciting journey to the past, we see a clear example of how innovation and technology can change the course of history, even in surprising ways. Elizabeth uses a simple toy laser pointer, a modern piece of technology, to protect colonists during the Boston Tea Party, showing how even small tools can make a big difference. This ties directly into Sustainable Development Goal 9 (SDG 9), which focuses on building resilient infrastructure, promoting inclusive and sustainable industrialization, and fostering innovation.

Innovation is about creating and using new ideas and tools to solve problems, and Elizabeth’s laser pointer acts as a symbol of that. Although it’s just a toy, it represents how technology can empower people to protect their communities and work smarter, not harder.

Furthermore, infrastructure—the basic systems and tools people rely on—plays a vital role in supporting progress. Whether it’s roads, communication systems, or tools like Elizabeth’s slingshot, good infrastructure helps communities stay strong and connected.

Elizabeth’s story reminds us that innovation and infrastructure don’t always mean huge machines or factories. Sometimes, it’s the clever use of simple technology that helps us face challenges and build a better future. This lesson from the past encourages us to support new ideas and invest in tools that improve lives today and in the future.

5. Learn About SDG 9: Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure - Video Quiz

Understanding Sustainable Development Goal 9, which focuses on Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure, can be more engaging when students interact directly with the content. That’s why we’ve created an interactive video quiz using BookWidgets to bring the topic to life for younger students.

This quiz is based on a short, animated educational video that introduces the key components of SDG 9 in a fun and age-appropriate way. As the video plays, students are prompted with drag-and-drop, multiple-choice, and fill-in-the-blank questions that test their understanding in real time.

6. SDG 9 - Bingo

Looking for a creative way to teach Sustainable Development Goal 9? Try this interactive SDG 9 Bingo exercise! This engaging classroom activity helps students explore key concepts, such as industry, innovation, and infrastructure, through hands-on tasks, research challenges, and visual prompts.

In this Bingo-style learning game, students complete tasks such as identifying examples of smart cities, drawing future innovations, and matching terms to real-world infrastructure projects. It’s a powerful way to deepen understanding of SDG 9 while keeping lessons active and student-centered.

Here's how this SDG 9 lesson idea works: Divide your students in groups of four. The groups have 1 bingo sheet and need to tick off a field when they addressed it in the group. The group that gets 4 in a row wins! Keep playing the game, though. It's even a bigger accomplishment when they can tick off all the fields on the bingo card!

7. Learning About Smart Cities - Quiz

This interactive exercise strengthens reading comprehension, critical thinking, and digital literacy skills while encouraging students to make real-world connections to SDG 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure.

Whether used as a quick knowledge check or a starting point for group discussion, the Smart Cities quiz is a dynamic tool for turning information into insight.

8. Draw Your Smart City - Whiteboard Widget

One of the most engaging ways to connect students with the ideas behind Sustainable Development Goal 9, industry, innovation, and infrastructure, is through creativity. In this Whiteboard Widget activity, students are challenged to design their own smart city using digital drawing tools.

This hands-on exercise combines imagination with real-world problem-solving. Students consider how cities can use technology, clean energy, and modern infrastructure to become more sustainable, efficient, and inclusive. They'll design smart buildings, solar-powered transit, green public spaces, and tech-based solutions to urban challenges, all while reinforcing key SDG 9 concepts, such as innovation and sustainable industrialization.

Drawing and sketching digitally can be a challenge. With this activity, students may choose to do it on paper. They just need to upload their finished work using the photo icon in the whiteboard. This way, you, the teacher, can still use the feedback and annotation tools in the BookWidgets reporting dashboard.

More ready-to-use SDG lesson plans and resources

Reminder: This is part nine of our blog post series with lesson activities for teaching the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. We will post a new blog about the next SDG every month. Go check out earlier blog posts on the SDGs:

• 8 Engaging Lesson Plans to Teach "SDG 1: No Poverty" to Your Students
• 8 Creative Ways to Teach "SDG 2: Zero Hunger" to Your Students
• 8 Free Lesson Plans to Teach "SDG 3: Good Health and Well-Being"
• Bringing SDG 4 into the Classroom: 8 Lesson Ideas for Quality Education
• 8 Free Lesson Plans on SDG 5 Gender Equality for all Grade Level Students
• 8 Free Digital Lessons for Teaching SDG 6: Clean Water and Sanitation
• 8 Exciting Lesson Ideas to Teach Students About SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
• 8 Digital Lessons to Teach Students about SDG 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth

And if you can't wait this long for all the other posts, we've already created 1 lesson for each SDG in this digital group work planner activity. Here's the blog post about teaching the SDGs, and you can find all the separate SDG activities in this BookWidgets group folder in case you want to duplicate the activities and make some changes.

Wrap up

Teaching SDG 9: Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure through interactive, student-centered activities empowers learners to explore how technology, creativity, and sustainable design can solve real-world problems. These ready-to-use BookWidgets lessons help students develop future-ready skills such as critical thinking, systems design, and collaborative problem-solving while engaging with global goals in a meaningful way. Every activity can be duplicated, customized, and shared with your students in just a few clicks, making it easy to integrate SDG 9 into any subject or grade level.

Be sure to follow along as we continue our monthly SDG series with new digital lessons and classroom ideas!

Want to learn more about creating engaging lesson activities with BookWidgets?

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