I will begin a new job as parish music director in about three weeks, part of which involves teaching general music twice a week in the K-7 school of a sister parish. This is a very rural region of the country, and the sister parish and school are in a small town and very closely associated with each other and with the entire local community. The school has, I believe, just about 40 kids altogether.

The structure of classes is that I get K-2 for thirty minutes a day, twice a week, and 3-7 for thirty minutes a day, twice a week, as well as a 15-minute prep period for liturgical music with the whole school and a weekly all-school Mass. I plan, select, and execute all the music for the Mass. I also plan, although do not always execute, the music for the sister parish to which this school is attached (which is executed largely by volunteers).

Now, there is already a band teacher who also gives private instruction in instrumental music after school, so I don't feel a lot of pressure to introduce instrumental music into the general classroom.

I'm wondering if the Voice for Life program might not work as a good curriculum for my music classes, treating the entire student body as a single large choir, singing for the all-school liturgies every week, and then gradually involving them in the parish music more and more? My classes are both inter-generational and age-segregated, and I could easily use the liturgy prep period to "put things together" between the grades.

I know this program has been implemented successfully as an after-school enrichment, with great results, and I will have the advantage of compulsory attendance at rehearsals. It also has the advantage of giving every music class theoretical and historical enrichment while also achieving practical goals and performances.

Thoughts? Reservations?