KATHMANDU, Nepal -- Thousands of schools across the districts worst hit by two major earthquakes in Nepal reopened Sunday.

With most school buildings damaged or unsafe, the Education Ministry ordered that classes be held in temporary classrooms.

The earthquakes on April 25 and May 12 killed 8,693 people and injured 22,221 others. It's estimated that more than 90 per cent of schools were destroyed in the worst-hit districts of Gorkha, Sindhupalchok and Nuwakot.

According to a UNICEF statement, 32,000 classrooms were destroyed and 15,352 classrooms were damaged after the two major earthquakes in Nepal.

Nepal's high dropout rate was already a major concern, UNICEF said adding there were estimated 985,000 children who couldn't return to classes on Sunday, thus facing a great risk of dropping out of school.

Niraj Kayanstha, a teacher at Changuranayan school, east of Kathmandu, told state-run Radio Nepal that about half of the 400 students came to school on Sunday. They were not studying but singing and dancing and talking to teachers about their experience during the earthquakes.

Government inspectors who were sent to the schools gave green stickers for safe buildings or red stickers for damaged ones.