Business
Intermediate
60 mins
Teacher/Student led
Learning Goals
Learning Outcomes
+60 XP
What you need:
Chromebook/Laptop/PC or iPad/Tablet
IWB/Projector/Large Screen

Digital & AI in Business

Explore how real businesses use digital and AI tools to work smarter. You'll identify two or three tools that could help your mini-business, use one to create an actual asset, and record your choices with responsible-use points.

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    1 - Getting Started

    Illustration for Getting StartedMost real businesses in 2025 already use digital tools every day, and a lot of them use AI to speed up the boring parts. The owner of a small Irish craft business might use a free design app for product photos, an AI chatbot to draft replies to repeat customer questions, and a free spreadsheet to track what sold each weekend. None of those tools replace the owner's thinking, but together they save hours.

    Your mini-business is no different. With most of the term's work already in your portfolio, you've got a customer persona, a business model, a budget, a marketing plan and a draft pitch. Now the question is: which jobs in your business could a digital or AI tool genuinely help with, and where do you have to stay in charge?

    Warm up

    Think for 30 seconds: name one job a small business owner does in a week (anything, designing a sign, replying to a customer, working out tomorrow's order, taking photos of a new product). Now ask yourself: could a digital or AI tool make that job faster, or is it the kind of job that needs a human brain in charge?

    Heads up: there's a substantial homework task before next week's Pitch Day. Make sure to check the last step of today's lesson before you log off so you know what to do this week.

    👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

    +5 XP

    2 - What You'll Learn

    Four ideas underpin today's lesson. The first two tell you what kinds of tools exist; the second two tell you how to use them without getting burned.

    ConceptWhy it mattersExample
    Digital tool — software that helps a business get a job done faster or better than doing it by hand (a free design app, a survey tool, a free spreadsheet, a messaging app)Hand-doing every job burns hours you don't have in a 10-week TY project.A TY smoothie cart at GAA matches uses a free design app for its stall sign instead of hand-lettering it.
    AI tool — software that generates or analyses content (text, ideas, images) by pattern-matching on huge amounts of training data; it predicts what would usually come next, it doesn't actually understand your businessAI is fast at drafts and options, but it doesn't know your business and will get specifics wrong unless you check.The smoothie team asks an AI chatbot for 10 stall-name ideas, picks 2, and tweaks one.
    Responsible use — using a tool without leaking private information, checking what AI produces before you act on it, and keeping a person in charge of the real decisionsA leaked customer detail can't be taken back, and an AI mistake printed on real leaflets is your mistake, not the tool's.A TY mini-company selling handmade phone stands strips names from survey answers before pasting them into an AI tool to summarise the responses.
    Human in the loop — treating AI as an assistant, not a replacement: AI drafts, but a person reads, edits, and decides what actually reaches a customerLet AI ship straight to customers without checking, and eventually you'll publish something off-brand, wrong, or made-up.A TY tutoring service uses AI to draft answers to common parent questions for its FAQ page, then re-reads every answer before publishing.
    Key point

    Notice the pattern: AI is good at drafting, generating options, and summarising. You are good at choosing, editing, and judging whether something is actually true and on-brand. The right setup uses both.

    👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

    +10 XP

    3 - Worked Example: Goal Boost Smoothies

    Illustration for Worked Example: Goal Boost SmoothiesBefore you build your own toolkit, read this short worked example. Goal Boost is a fictional TY mini-company run by three students in a small Irish town, selling homemade fruit smoothies at GAA underage matches on Saturday mornings. They have three jobs to do this week, and they've been thinking about which tools would actually help.

    Job 1: Design a stall sign with the name and four prices

    Tool chosen: a free online design app with ready-made templates.

    Why: none of them are confident with hand-lettering, and a template means the sign will look professional without taking a full evening. They drag in the template, type the four prices, and export.

    Watch out

    One responsible-use point: only use the app's free stock images or photos they took themselves of their own smoothies. Don't grab photos from another bakery's social media, that's someone else's work.

    Job 2: Find out which flavours classmates would buy

    Tool: a free online survey form, with the link dropped in a class group chat. A clipboard works, but a link reaches far more people in five minutes than a lunch break with paper would. Responsible-use point: the survey asks only for the flavour answer, not for names, addresses, or phone numbers. Collecting extra personal details just because you can is a privacy red flag.

    Job 3: Draft an Instagram caption for the launch post

    Tool: an AI chatbot. They're blanking on what to write, so they ask for five caption angles and pick one to tweak. Responsible-use point: human in the loop. The AI suggested "Fuel your game with Goal Boost: nature's energy in every sip!" which sounds nothing like a TY student and makes an unverified claim about ingredients. The team rewrote it to "Half-time smoothies at the U14s: €3, see you Saturday." Same idea, sounds like an actual TY student wrote it, no made-up claims.

    Spot the pattern

    Key point

    Goal Boost picked one digital tool (design app), one digital tool (survey form), and one AI tool (chatbot). Each tool does one specific job, not everything. Each has one responsible-use rule that's actually relevant to that job: copyright for the images, privacy for the survey, human-checking for the AI text. That's the model for your own toolkit.

    Now your turn. Use the brainstorm below to list 2 or 3 jobs in your own mini-business where a digital or AI tool could genuinely help. Don't pick tools yet, just list the jobs. You'll match jobs to tools when you fill in your portfolio page in the next step.

    +15 XP

    4 - Build Your Digital & AI Toolkit

    Illustration for Build Your Digital & AI ToolkitThis is your 09_digital_ai_plan portfolio page. You're going to take the 2 or 3 jobs you brainstormed in the last step and turn them into a real toolkit for your mini-business: which tool, what job it does, and one responsible-use point per tool.

    Which tools can you use?

    Ask first

    Your teacher will tell you which specific tools are approved on your school network, ask before you start. The kinds of tools that fit this lesson are:

    • A free AI chatbot your school allows (for text drafts, brand-name options, FAQ answers)
    • A free design app like Canva or a similar template-based tool (for menus, posters, stall signs)
    • A free survey or forms tool like Google Forms or Microsoft Forms (for quick customer research)
    Note

    If none of these are accessible on your device today, draft your asset in a normal document and note which tool you would have used. The thinking is what's being graded, not the polish.

    How to fill it in

    The first row of the table has been completed for you using the Goal Boost example so you can see the shape. Fill in 2 more rows with your own tools. Keep each cell short, one phrase, not a paragraph. Then complete the footer: pick one tool from your list, actually use it to make something for your business right now, and record what you made, what you kept, and what you changed.

    Footer task (pick one)

    • Ask an AI chatbot for 5 brand-name or tagline options for your business, then pick and tweak one
    • Rewrite the one-sentence marketing message from your 07_marketing_page until it's sharper
    • Mock up a one-page menu, price list, or stall poster in a free design app
    • Draft a short customer FAQ with 3 questions and answers (longer option, pick this only if you've got time)
    Tip

    Whatever you produce, paste it (or describe it) into the footer with one line on which tool you used and what you kept or changed. This is the asset that proves your toolkit isn't just a list, you actually used it.

    Digital & AI Toolkit for My Mini-Business
    Pick 2 or 3 digital or AI tools your mini-business will use. For each one, name the tool, write the specific job it will do for your business, and note ONE responsible-use point you'll actually follow. Then use one of those tools in the footer task to produce a real asset for your business.
    Tool What job it does for my business One responsible-use point
    Free online design app (template-based) Drafts the stall sign and a one-page menu I'd otherwise have to draw by hand Use only my own photos or the app's free stock images, don't grab pictures from someone else's website
    Your conclusion
    Now use ONE of your tools to actually make something for your business: 5 brand-name options, a sharper one-line marketing message, a one-page menu mock-up, or a short customer FAQ. Below, write (1) which tool you used, (2) what you asked it to do, and (3) what you kept and what you changed before it would be ready for a real customer.
    +10 XP

    5 - Think About It

    You've just built a toolkit and used one of the tools for real. Take a minute to step back from the worksheet and think about the bigger question that sits behind today's lesson.

    Think about

    • Looking at your toolkit and the asset you produced: where in your business could AI genuinely help, and where do you think a person needs to stay firmly in charge no matter how good the tool gets?
    • What's the one responsible-use rule you'll actually follow this term, the one that would matter most if your business were real and selling to real customers tomorrow?
    +10 XP

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    This lesson is copyright of Coding Ireland 2017 - 2025. Unauthorised use, copying or distribution is not allowed.
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