Children in the Gaza Strip have returned to lessons inside tents set up among displacement camps, in an attempt to resume education after years of bombardment and displacement and damage to educational facilities. Their days begin with a morning assembly in a sandy area before they head to tents converted into classrooms that lack protective walls against the heat, sufficient desks and basic facilities.
Footage shows children raising their hands during assembly and entering the temporary classrooms, after queues during the war became associated in their lives with collecting water, aid and food. In the new learning space, their names are called again to record attendance, and they open their notebooks as they try to regain part of the school routine disrupted by the war.
Shortages of desks and water hinder learning
A teacher working in one of the tents said children were eager to study despite the surrounding conditions, but described the site as unsuitable for use as a classroom. Students sit on tarpaulins spread over the ground in intense heat, with shortages of water, toilets and desks. She added that those enrolled include children of people killed and wounded who are trying to continue their education despite the losses they have suffered.
The difficulties are not limited to the nature of the site, as the duration of lessons and the number of subjects taught to the children have been reduced. A pupil said the current school day lasts only three hours and is held once every two days, while the curriculum is limited to four subjects: Arabic, English, mathematics and science.
The pupil compared this with her former school day, when she spent between five and six hours at school and studied six subjects in a building with desks, windows, books and more learning materials. In the current situation, the tent does not provide the stability the children knew in traditional classrooms; instead, it remains associated in their memories with displacement and its hardships.
Another teacher described the start of the school year as a mixture of optimism and sadness. The child, she said, has lost their home, stationery and educational environment, then returned to learning in a place that does not protect them from the heat or provide the minimum stability needed for education.
Psychosocial activities to address the effects of war
Alongside lessons, games, puppet theatre shows and interactive activities are organised inside the tents, with the aim of combining education with psychosocial support.
These activities aim to help children who bring the effects of bombardment, displacement and the loss of family members or homes into the classroom, rather than treating their return as a normal resumption of education. An education supervisor said those running the initiatives were trying to move children from queues for communal meals, water and the streets to the queue for school and education.
Missing educational needs and long distances
He added that some children walk long distances to reach their places of learning, in an environment where the journey itself has become arduous, while needs related to survival take precedence over other daily requirements. Among the students is an injured boy who reaches the school leaning on a crutch.
The boy said he had come to learn after years of bombardment and displacement and the destruction of schools, explaining that he wanted to release what he described as negative energy through his studies. His injury reflects one aspect of the effects of war that children carry into the classroom, whether in their bodies or their memories.
Another pupil said she aspired to be among the top students, despite the tents lacking the facilities available at her school before the war. This ambition comes as students try to regain their educational path despite the temporary conditions and the reduction in lesson hours and available subjects. In shelter schools, complaints about the loss of books, stationery and desks are recurrent.
359 temporary learning spaces for the new school year
An education official said the schools operate under the umbrella of UNRWA, but need these basic requirements to be provided so they can make up for the learning losses accumulated during years of disrupted education. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimated that preparations for the new school year in Gaza include 359 temporary learning spaces.
The office said obstacles to providing safe education remained, including displacement, insecurity, damage to facilities and restrictions on access. Temporary learning spaces alone do not provide a complete alternative to schools, and the resumption of lessons cannot immediately make up for years of disruption.
Education requires books, desks, stationery and safe water, as well as roads and transport to enable children to reach classrooms, followed by sufficient time to address what they have missed. A mother said the distance and lack of transport worried her, particularly as the war had not completely ended.
She added that she feared shrapnel could hit her children on the way, but continued sending them to school because her hope that they would learn and live outweighed her fear. The tents remain unable to provide the full meaning of school or guarantee the usual safety and stability, but they give children an opportunity to return to lessons, raise their hands and answer questions.
Amid shortages and surrounding risks, these spaces represent a limited start to returning children to education and attempting to make up for years in which they lost regular schooling.
