Discover the Readymade Music Literacy Program

Readymade Music Literacy (RML) was primarily designed to be used in the first year of instrumental or vocal instruction outside of the elementary experience. The target age is 10-14, or 4th-8th grade.  RML's creator, Rob Chilton, created the first iterations of the program for use with his 6th grade beginning band students.  You can read more about Chilton's story creating RML at the bottom of this webpage.

Most of our users are beginning band, choir, or orchestra teachers using RML in the first year of instrumental or vocal instruction outside of the elementary experience.  For the majority of those programs, that's 6th grade.

Recently, we've had several elementary/intermediate campuses subscribe to use RML for use with their general music 4th or 5th graders in their last year of elementary/intermediate before going to the middle school experience.  We've also had a few programs subscribe and use it with their older more advanced 7th or 8th graders as a way to provide remediation!

RML is easy to use!  All you have to do is show your class a short and engaging video lesson and have them complete the accompanying worksheet.   To get started, there are 40 total lessons.  That’s enough material to do one lesson per week for the duration of the school year if used to its full potential.  

Lesson 1 is divided into five 8-minute videos with accompanying worksheets designed for daily use the first week of school to jumpstart the year and get your students reading music. 

• Lesson 1A - The Musical Alphabet
• Lesson 1B - The Natural Keys of the Piano
• Lesson 1C - The Accidental Keys of the Piano
• Lesson 1D - Basic Staff Notation
• Lesson 1E - Basic Beat & Rhythm

Our users tell us Lesson 1 is especially helpful the first week of school because it gives their students something authentic to work on each day while they, the teachers, take care of all the little things that seem to pile up!  That's exactly why it was created!

After Lesson 1, the program is designed to be done once a week when used to its max potential.  Lessons 2-36 videos are approximately 15 minutes in length and the worksheets take between 10-20 minutes to complete.  Most of our users do RML midweek on either Wednesday or Thursday.  (We’ve even heard some of our users calling Thursday “Theory Thursday!”)

You can find more information about the curriculum and video durations in the curriculum document available at the top of this webpage.

Every lesson is written, taught, and produced by an accomplished and experienced music educator you can trust, Readymade Music’s creator and owner, Rob Chilton.  Read more about Chilton in his bio at the bottom of this webpage.

We advise our teachers to try and complete at least  2/3rds of the program, or through Lesson 25.  Take a look at the curriculum and rhythm documents at the top of this page.  You’ll notice that completion through Lesson 25 will provide your students with full knowledge of whole notes down to 8th notes.  More importantly, in Lessons 15-25 they’ll develop a comprehensive understanding of how to use 8th note subdivision to understand more complicated rhythms such as the dotted quarter note.  Completion through Lesson 25 will also finalize the connections between the staff and piano keyboard allowing your students to fully comprehend accidentals and enharmonics.

As with many things, results are a product of consistency.   We encourage our teachers to do RML weekly as regularly as possible.  Our users report that the most significant results from RML appear between Lessons 15-25 after the foundation has been established.  On average, 75% of our schools finish between Lessons 15-25, about 20% finish between Lessons 26-35, and 5% complete all 36 lessons.  It’s up to you how far you go and how you use the program!  

Finally, don’t be afraid to occasionally take a week off if you need to prepare for a performance.  We advise our teachers to try and avoid taking more than two weeks off when possible.  Like practicing, the longer you step away from it, the harder it is to get back into the groove. 

Remember that RML makes for great sub plans!  We encourage our teachers to use RML when they are going to be out sick or away for a conference.  Your classes could do three back-to-back days of RML when you’re away at your next professional development clinic!

The lessons were designed to be done in order.  You may find that doing the lessons out of order interferes with the scope and sequence.  There's also eight characters and a small narrative that's weaved into the series that may be interrupted by the skipping lessons.

We recommend doing the videos in order if this is your first time using RML.  As you become more familiar with the program, you may discover a lesson or two that you want to skip in order to get further in the program.  That's totally OK!  Use RML the way it works best for you!

The Band, Choir, and General Music channels come with one video per lesson that instructs both Treble/Bass clef.

The Orchestra channel comes with two videos per lesson.  One video teaches Treble/Bass and the other teaches Treble/Alto.

At RML, we believe in teaching two clefs to every child for the following reasons:

• It's easier to teach heterogeneous "mixed instrument" classes where some kids are reading one clef while others are reading another. 
• It's easier to change a student's instrument later on to correct placement or instrumentation issues.
• For those learning Treble/Bass, it opens up the possibility for kids to teach themselves the piano.

You will notice that the worksheets also include two clefs. We recommend having your students learn both clefs, but you can totally ask your students to ignore the questions that are not in their clef if you would prefer to focus on just one clef!

Click on the COUNTINGS document at the top of this page to see the basic counting system for RML.

For the purposes of choosing your counting system with RML -

• Eastman is 1 ti te ta
• Traditional is  1 e & a

We use 1 la li for triplets in both counting systems.

That's totally OK!  We made the counting system as simple as possible while developing RML to ensure it would be easily applicable to a wide audience.  Your students will have no problem adjusting if you use extra dashes, backslashes, or other cool ornamentation.

For example, here's a fun story!  The first year we beta-tested RML, our wind players used Eastman counting while our percussionists used Traditional.  We made all the kids watch the Eastman videos as we had not yet developed a Traditional program.  The percussionists had no problem replacing TE's with &'s.

And here's another one!  We recently visited a program that uses backslashes instead of parenthesis for rests.  Their students had no problem watching RML use parenthesis on-screen and then using backslashes on their worksheets.

One last example!   We use the "&" symbol in the Traditional counting system.  Some of our schools prefer to use the "+" symbol.  That's totally fine!  Our users have reported the kids have no problem viewing "&" on the screen and writing "+" on the worksheet!

We believe when you watch RML you'll find the counting system to be simple and intuitive.  It may already be the same as what you're using!  If it's not, rest  assured (pun intended) that your students will have no problem adjusting!

RML is great for percussionists!  RML was designed with the idea that multiple mixed instrumentation classes might be combined together.  For a number of reasons, RML works great with percussion!

1) Your percussionists will learn to read both Treble and Bass clefs!  Have you ever run into either of these issues before?

• Perhaps your percussionists are excellent at reading rhythm, but playing bells or other keyboard parts are a challenge?  RML starts teaching staff notation from the first week of school even if they aren't going to see it for a while!
• Have you passed out a new piece of music and the marimba part has bass clef in it?  With RML, that won't be a problem because your percussionists will learn to read both Treble and Bass clefs starting the first week of school!

2) Every program has a slightly different approach to teaching mallets.  Some schools introduce it in the early Fall semester while some wait until the Spring semester.  Regardless of when you introduce mallets, your percussionists will learn to read the piano keyboard well before they actually play a bell kit, marimba, or similar.  In fact, they'll start learning how to read the piano keyboard on the first week of school!  Our users tell us that RML's approach truly accelerates learning mallets making the process more fun for everyone!

3) RML introduces rhythms in a sequence that is very logical and will strengthen rhythmic comprehension in your percussionists even if they are already working on smaller subdivisions of the beat in their percussion class.

RML was created with this problem in mind!  Every concept is reviewed multiple times across multiple lessons to ensure that an occasional absence won't create learning gaps that are impossible to fill.

From RML's creator, Rob Chilton:

"I also dealt with absence issues when I taught middle school band.  Sometimes, a kid was sick.  Other times, they were in a private lesson.  On occasion, they might be in the nurse's office or locked down in in-school suspension.  Whatever the reason they were absent, I knew I had to structure the RML curriculum to allow flexibility for these occurrences.  That's one of the reasons for the thorough amount of review contained in RML.  I knew it wouldn't be feasible to try and catch kids up when the other days of the week were spent on playing our instruments.  The curriculum had to allow for additional opportunities to learn the material!

When a kid did miss a lesson, it wasn't uncommon for us to just let that child skip that week's lesson and give them the worksheet to complete on their own if we thought they could do it without watching the lesson.  Sometimes we would pair them up with another student and ask the other child to give them a summarization of the lesson.  Other times, we would let them watch the lesson on our computer in a space that was within our sight such as the office or a practice room.  Finally, there were also times we would just give them an exempt grade for that week and not worry about it!

We also had a few solutions for kids that routinely missed lessons due to private lessons.  First, the video lessons only take 15 minutes. Therefore, we asked our lesson teachers to rotate which kid took the first lesson on "theory day."  Then, we'd follow the suggestions in the above paragraph for the kid that took the first lesson.

Finally, it's impossible to ensure that every child is present for every lesson.  I suspect that regular classroom teachers deal with this issue a lot!  That's one of the reasons there's so much built-in review.  It's not just about retention, it's also about ensuring that everyone learns regardless of absence issues!  Do the best you can and don't worry about it too much!  With RML, you're covered!"

You bet!  Over the years, we found that our favorite way to grade the worksheets was in-class upon completion.  We recommend the following format for first time users - 

• The students watch the video lesson while the teacher actively monitors
• Pass out the worksheet after the video lesson finishes
• Students do the worksheet and bring it up their teacher upon completion
• Teacher gives the worksheet a quick once-over for grading
• If the worksheet is a 100%, the teacher puts the grade in the gradebook right away and the child returns to their seat and files the worksheet in their binder
• If the worksheet is not 100%, the teacher marks errors and sends the student back to their seat to do corrections
• Once the student completes the corrections they come back for checking
• If the worksheet is a 100%, the teacher puts the grade in the gradebook right then and the child returns to their seat and files the worksheet in their binder. If not, repeat the corrections process until the student has a grade you deem acceptable

All of the above can be done in one 30-40 minute class period.  We liked grading the work in class because it meant we never had to take worksheets home for grading.  We also liked the "corrections system" because the students knew we weren’t going to just let them “turn it in.”  It held them accountable to pay attention during the lessons and do their best work the first time.

Many of our users have their own systems too!  Don’t be afraid to experiment and find the strategy that works best for you!

RML is accessed directly from our website, www.readymademusic.net.  Click "Log in" or “My Library” and login in the top right corner.  Once logged in, you’ll have access to all your subscribed content.

You’ll need  two devices to show the videos to your students:

1. A desktop computer, laptop, tablet, or phone that is connected to the internet to stream the videos.
2. A screen to cast the videos to your class.  This can be a TV, projector, smart board, or similar device.

This is a great question!  Most teachers are equipped with a computer/device with internet access these days, but not everyone has a TV, projector, or smart board.  We recommend you talk with your campus technology department and/or librarian.  They may have something sitting in storage that you can use!  

We have one such program in Richardson, Texas.  The junior high directors teach beginning band on a dozen different elementary campuses.  Their classrooms include non-traditional spaces such as empty classrooms, cafeterias, stages, and other miscellaneous rooms.  Not every one of their “learning spaces” has a screen, so they've had to get creative about finding technology on each campus.  At some of the campuses, the teachers wheel down a TV or projector from the library.  Other campuses take their kids to another free classroom where another teacher is off to the library to access a screen.

Yes!  Once subscribed, we'll send you instructions to download the mobile app so you can stream from your tablet or smart phone!

We are working on it!  However, at this time RML does not offer closed captioning or subtitles.  We are currently working on English subtitles which are projected to be available for the 2024-2025 school year.  Quickly thereafter, we plan to release Spanish subtitles.

RML is $365 per program annually.  You will receive:

• Three director logins
• Access to show videos in class
• Access to print/copy worksheets for class

“Per program” means one single and specific program per campus.  For example, the Readymade Middle School Band subscription is $365.  It is an additional $365 if the Readymade Middle School Orchestra also wants to purchase a subscription.  Sharing of logins is not permitted.

“Annually” means from July 1 of the subscribing year to June 30 of the following year.  For example, if you subscribe in August of 2023, your subscription runs from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2024.

*There is a limit of three director logins per program.  All three director logins must be from the same single and specific program per campus.

In our experience, most programs per campus have one or two directors.  There are sometimes those that have three and on occasion we have seen programs that have more than three.  This is sometimes the case when a high school director comes down to the junior high for a period or two during the day to teach a beginner class.

We encourage combining classes of the same class period  for RML when possible.  Combining classes will reduce the number of logins you will need because the same teacher or two can stay logged in all day.  This also allows you to rotate who is on active monitoring duty while the other teacher(s) can tutor individuals that need assistance, catch up on grade or data entry, or even take care of clerical tasks such as lesson planning or emailing.    It's also a nice way for the kids from other classes to get to see and know each other which is great for peer relationship building and strengthening the overall group! 

If combining classes is not an option and you still need an additional login, complete the order form with your three requests and all of your information. At the same time you submit your order, send an email to [email protected] detailing your extra login request. 

We charge flat fee of $120 for each additional login.  Bulk discounts will only be applied if the extra login request is received at the same time as the bulk order spreadsheet.

Sharing your logins (usernames and passwords) with anyone is not permitted.  If all directors are going to be absent and you want to share your username and password with a substitute for a one-day use you may do so at your own discretion.  In the aforementioned scenario, we suggest that you temporarily change your password.

We offer bulk order discounts for clusters and districts.  Visit our store to find out more!

Visit our STORE and place a single order or start a bulk order today!

Of course!  You can still fill out an order if your staff is incomplete.  If you're in the process of hiring a new director and you're not sure who it will be, you can just put TBD or similar in the second or third director spot.  This will let us know to expect another login for you.  If you forget, that's OK too!

Once you've made you're hire, just send us an email ([email protected]) and let us know the following for your new hire -

• Title (ex. Assistant Band Director)
• First Name
• Last Name
• Email

Then, we'll set them up an account! 

You bet!  You’ll have the opportunity to indicate that you'd like to use a purchase order at the bottom of the order form.  

Then, please leave specific instructions for us so we can complete any paperwork necessary for you to be able to complete payment.  Examples of instructions could be the following - 

1) Please send us your W9 along with the bill so we can complete payment.

2) Please complete our district's vendor application.  (Then, you can provide us with a link to your district's application which can be on your districts website or a PDF file you've uploaded to a cloud storage such as Google Drive.)

3) Contact ____ (and insert name and email) to set-up vendor status.

Let us know what you need and we'll get it done!

Some schools and/or districts have fiscal years that start after school starts.  For example, one common date is September 1st of each year.  Many districts require their teachers to wait until September 1 or after to purchase with funds designated for the current school year.  If you're in this situation, we don't want that to hinder your ability to subscribe and use the content with your students the first week of school!

For that reason, we'll set-up your account as soon as you order your subscription.  When placing your order, please specify the date you want to appear on your bill under the form heading:

"For those with delayed fiscal year start dates (ex. September 1), please specify the date you would like your bill to read. (##/##/####)."

As long as visible effort to complete the payment process is evident, we will allow up to 60 days for your organization to remit payment after your bill date before your account may be suspended or terminated.

Sometimes it takes a bit of time for school organizations to complete the purchase order process and remit payment.  We don't want that to limit your ability to subscribe and use the content with your students.  We want you to have access right especially if school is about to start! 

For that reason, we'll set-up your account as soon as you order your subscription with us and initiate the billing process.  As long as visible effort to complete the payment process is evident, we will allow up to 60 days for your organization to remit payment after your bill date before your account may be suspended or terminated.

The worksheets are not available for sale separate from the total RML program.