POGGIO PICENZE, Italy - Children toting knapsacks and notebooks entered three "classrooms" erected in a blue tent city Thursday, a symbolic return to normalcy for some of the youngest victims of Italy's earthquake.
The mayor of the tiny village of Poggio Picenze rang a small bell to summon the children to their desks, arranged in rows in the tent with a blackboard in front as school reopened a few kilometres from the hard-hit city of L'Aquila for the first time since the April 6 temblor.
The children were kept away from the media, but Sky TG24 television interviewed one fourth grader who said she was thrilled to go back since she had missed school. "I'm happy," said the youngster, who wasn't identified. "I missed my friends and teachers."
Middle school teacher Liberata Marchi said most of the year's school work had already been completed before the quake struck. But she stressed the need for classes to continue.
"Being together, playing with other children, letting them have fun, this is important," she said. "It will be tough, but we'll put everything we have into being here to help these children."
Children holding notebooks and their mothers' hands gathered in a small play yard outside the tents, where a small slide and seesaw were placed alongside potted flowers and trees.
Some volunteers started lessons Wednesday in another tent city, but Thursday's opening in Poggio Picenze marked the official restart of the school year for victims of the 6.3-magnitude quake, which killed 294 people and destroyed thousands of buildings in central Italy's Abruzzo region.
"We have to return as soon as possible to normal life," Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said as he arrived to tour the makeshift school.
Education Minister Mariastella Gelmini said the school opening was a "small but important sign" that normalcy was returning and that it could help the children overcome the trauma of having lost friends or relatives in the temblor.
Some 30 lower-and middle-school students showed up for class, said Poggio Picenze Mayor Nicola Menna, himself a tent resident since the quake.
He said two of the village's students weren't there: they were among the five village residents killed in the quake. Some others left the area with their families and are staying at hotels along the coast, he said, his voice hoarse from living in the cold for over a week.
"We'll try to do the best we can," he said just before ringing the bell to call the students to class. "Today we'll start like this, then slowly we hope to be able to organize ourselves at least through June. By September, we'll have to do something else."
The village's school was damaged in the quake, though it remains standing, said engineer Lucio Ciammitti, a village official. "You can see the damage from outside, but we haven't inspected it yet."
Civil protection chief Guido Bertolaso noted that Thursday's start was only a "partial reopening" and that it would still take time for other schools to get underway, either in tent cities or in buildings deemed safe enough to house students.
Gelmini insisted that none of the children would lose the school year as a result of the quake and said she had signed a decree allowing quake victims who had relocated to enroll in any school across the country.
Of the 55,000 people displaced by the quake, an estimated 33,000 are living in the 100-plus tent cities erected in and around L'Aquila and the 26 towns and villages hit by the quake.
Berlusconi said the government was aiming to close the tent cities before it starts to get cold again in the autumn, finding accommodation for the homeless either in hotels or in private homes.
Bertolaso said an estimated 20,000 people probably won't be able to return to their homes because they are so damaged, and will need continued assistance through the summer at least.
Italy's interior minister has estimated rebuilding will cost at least $16 billion US.
