Create Personalized IEP Goal Data Sheets in Under 5 Minutes [Video Included]
- Jayson Davies
- 3 days ago
- 4 min read
About once a month, I receive the following question:
"Do you have any data sheets I can use to track IEP goals?"
For years, my answer to every email about this was a quick link to Teachers Pay Teachers. In fact, I even shared this tip in my A-Z School-Based OT Course.
For a long time, TPT proved to be a fast, convenient, and free way to find plug and play IEP data sheets. However, with Chat GPT and Gemini providing quality AI content for free, I had to give AI a try and see how it would do to help create data sheets.
In this article, I’ll walk you through why I used to recommend TPT, why that changed, and how you can now use ChatGPT to quickly generate tailored, HIPPA/FERPA-friendly data sheets for your students.
Why I Rarely Created My Own Goal Data Sheets (Until Now)
To be honest, I used TPT for data sheets because it felt like too much work to create a new data sheet for every student.
Between writing evaluations, attending IEPs, and delivering services, there simply wasn’t time to reinvent a new custom data sheet for each kid. The effort didn’t seem worth the outcome. As such, I’d usually end up reusing a generic sheet, scribbling changes in the margins, and hoping it would suffice.
In the years I did take time to create my own data sheets for kids, I found that I would use them until their IEP came up, but would then forget to update them afterwards.
As such, I would often download and print many copies of a few TPT data sheets to stash in my desk. That way, after each IEP I could grab one, write the student’s name on it, and place it in their file.
At the end of the day, the time saved using TPT data sheets simply outweighed my need for data tracking sheets to be specific to each student’s IEP goal.
Then Came ChatGPT
When ChatGPT first came on the scene a few years ago, drafting IEP goals and creating data sheets was one of the first tasks I gave to the AI. At that time, the new and exciting Open AI tool was nearly useless for data sheets.
The chatbot could draft an IEP goal, but it would become very confused if you asked it to create a chart or table.
Today, though, that is a different story. Even with the 100% free, no-email-required version of ChatGPT.
Now, with a single, well-crafted prompt, you can generate a student-specific goal tracking sheet in five minutes or less.
I pulled a goal from the OT Schoolhouse Goal Bank and paired it with this prompt to generate a data sheet that I could copy and paste into a Google Doc.
Please create a print-ready data sheet that I can copy into a Google Doc and give to a teacher to track an IEP goal. Include the student's Present Level of Performance, the annual goal, and all benchmarks or objectives. Also include a separate summary table for tracking progress over time.
I then gave ChatGPT that prompt and the goal information. Within a few minutes (Starbuck’s WiFi was very slow), Chat GPT created the data sheet you see below.
From there, all I had to do was copy and paste the AI output over to a Google Doc.
Tips for Pasting the AI Output into a Google Doc
Copying the AI-generated content into a Google Doc took just seconds. There is even a little “note” looking button that you click to quickly copy the entire output (See the video below). From there, I made a few tweaks to make it visually clean and easy for educators to use.
Here’s a step-by-step walkthrough:
Switch to landscape mode: Tables tend to display better in this format.
Clean up unnecessary formatting: ChatGPT often includes horizontal divider lines you can delete.
Make your tables visible: In Google Docs, click on the table, choose the three-dot menu, and bump the border thickness up to 0.5 pt to make lines visible.
Resize and customize: You can easily adjust column width or add/remove rows based on the goal complexity.
Organize it your way: You might want the goal objectives grouped separately from progress notes, or you might combine both into one table depending on your preference.
This quick customization process helps ensure the document looks professional and fits your data collection style.
Why This Is Now My Go-To Recommendation
Let’s be honest, documentation can feel overwhelming. That’s why I wanted to share this with everyone. There are many things we cannot or should not use AI for, but for the creation of data sheets, using AI is quick, customizable, compliant, and easily accessible.
Plus, the flexibility means you can create as many variations as needed: goal-specific sheets, daily or weekly tracking versions, or simplified classroom check-ins.
Watch It In Action
Want to see the process for turning a goal into a data sheet from start to finish? Watch the video below to see how I use ChatGPT to create a goal-tracking sheet in under 7 minutes.
Final Thoughts
If you’re spending more than 7 minutes creating data sheets for each student and are open to using AI, give this method a try.
ChatGPT has made it easier than ever to build personalized, printable tools that save time and improve documentation.
After you give it a try, shoot me an email at Jayson@otschoolhouse.com and let me know how it works for you.
Until next time, 👋 Jayson