Even now, I hear teachers say that wind instruments are difficult, or that they can't teach because they can't play them. So, think about whether it is possible to teach the recorder (which is also a wind instrument) or whether it would work well in a chorus.
  It seems that it is not that difficult for elementary school students to make sounds on a wind instrument. At least, it's much easier to get into than starting as an adult.
  Even so, it's important to teach them step by step, without expecting them to accidentally learn to play well.
  First, with any wind instrument, you give a minimum explanation of breathing and mouth shape (embouchure).
  With brass instruments, if you explain embouchure and then give them a mouthpiece, most students can immediately buzz, and of course they can make a sound when they attach an instrument to it.
  All brass instruments can produce several pitchs by simply controlling the lips and breath. Even children who play an instrument for the first time may be able to produce two or three sounds (over tones). After some practice, the number of sounds that can be produced will increase.
  The 1980s, when the number of brass bands in elementary schools began to increase, I had many opportunities to take shiny brass instruments out of their cases and explain how to play them in front of the students, and have students who have never held an instrument before actually make a sound.
  The number of instruments varied from school to school, with some schools only having trumpets, while others had everything from cornets to tubas, but I think students were having fun making sounds after just five or ten minutes of holding the instrument. The teachers in charge seemed relieved to see that all the problems had been solved.
  But that doesn't mean students can play in an ensemble right away. It gets harder from there.
  In the case of brass instruments, several sounds can be produced with the same finger, so if a student don't know what sound is being produced and the relationship between the sound and the printed music, the student can't use them in an ensemble.
  This is more a question of the ear than the technique of playing the instrument itself, and students who have been playing piano or other instruments since they were younger often make rapid progress when they start playing a brass instrument.
  If you incorporate a lot of lip slurs, arpeggios(broken chords), intervals, and third scales into your instrument practice, students can learn the relationship between the printed music and the sound in a shorter time.
  For woodwind instruments, I explain embouchure, and then have the students make sound using a mouthpiece and reed for clarinet or saxophone, or just the reed for oboe or bassoon.
  This is just a matter of learning the breath and mouth feel for each instrument, and there is no meaning in spending more time on it than that.   With the flute, the player can produce several overtones using just the head joint, so try changing the angle of breath. Some flute experts say it is better to spend time on this practice, but others say it is almost unnecessary. In order to keep elementary school students interested, I think it is better to have them put on the instrument as soon as they can make a sound.
  With any woodwind instrument, if student can make a sound with the mouthpiece or reed, then by attaching the instrument to it and learning the fingers, and the sound will come out according to the fingering(regardless of the tone), so even beginners can play songs at an early stage.
  The problem seems to be in many cases with poorly tuned instruments or reeds that do not fit the instrument (mouthpiece).
  Flutes and clarinets are also quite large, long, and heavy for elementary school students, and can be difficult for the fingers to reach. It is also important to be careful that they are not physically overdoing it.
  The quality of the tone of any instrument is not just a matter of how they play it.　It also depends on whether students know a good tone or not. It's best to listen to live performances, but even recorded performances can be very helpful.
  If you feel like something is not working in your band instruction, take some time to think about where the problem lies. Once you know the cause, you'll likely be able to find a solution to fix it.
  In many cases, I don't think the cause is the difficulty of playing wind or percussion instruments.