LEBANON — Lebanon elementary schools lost their music classes to budget cuts this year.

But thanks to a special effort by retired teacher Terri Krebs, yuletide carols will still be sung by the choir.

Krebs, a 33-year teacher, started her education career as a music teacher and retired this spring from her first- grade classroom at Pioneer School. She volunteered to come back and help Pioneer put on a Christmas program, prompting Superintendent Rob Hess to ask if she’d be willing to help with programs at the other K-5 and

K-8 schools.

Lacomb and Cascades also said they’d like Christmas concerts. Green Acres and Hamilton Creek asked for help with spring programs.

Krebs is now spending one day a week at each of the schools working on Christmas programs to help the students learn their songs.

She receives a stipend — $1,000 total — which Hess said is a “token of appreciation” for her work as a guest teacher. A jump in enrollment this year will mean more state dollars, which makes the stipend possible, Hess said.

Krebs spends about half an hour with each grade level at the three schools, and each classroom tapes the sessions for later practicing.

“Can you see all the words to this song?” Krebs asked a group of

second- and third-graders on Tuesday at Cascades Elementary School, indicating an overhead projector. “If you can’t see, move so you can see.”

Several small bodies shuffled obediently as teacher Randy Law, seated at the piano, played the opening bars of “Joy to the World.” Two verses later, Krebs held up her hands for quiet.

“I would like to go over part of that,” she told the group. “There’s some words you’re not quite sure of. That’s because the music does some fancy stuff: ‘The glo-o-ri-ies o-o-of, his ri-ighteou-ous-ne-e-ess.’”

Were she teaching an actual music class, Krebs said, she’d approach the work differently. Students wouldn’t be memorizing from an overhead, they’d learn the basics of rhythm and sight reading. They’d play instruments. They’d learn a variety of traditional songs, from patriotic tunes to American folk classics.

Neither she nor Hess sees work on the holiday programs as a substitute for a full-time music specialist.

“We’re just trying to keep a little bit of tradition,” Krebs said. “Hopefully, when times get better, we can have full-time music back, and I can just sit in the audience.”