Society
Classes resume after school killing
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-03-24 21:34
 |
Large Medium Small |
NANPING, Fujian - Classes of a primary school in east China's Fujian province resumed Wednesday, a day after a man stabbed and killed eight children there, as well as injuring others.
|
 Students decorate a mourning wall with handmade white flowers during a mourning ceremony in the campus, Nanping Experimental Primary School, Nanping of Fujian Province, March24, 2010. [Xinhua] |
Accompanied by their parents, students began to enter the Nanping Experimental Primary School at about 7 am Wednesday while teachers and 52 psychological therapists, including university students and psychologists from renowned hospitals, were welcoming them in all the 48 classrooms.
"It's the first time in four years that I have taken my son to school and I will keeping so," a father of an 11-year-old boy said.
|
||||
Led by teachers, students decorated a mourning wall with handmade white flowers in the campus. The mourning ceremony started at 8:12 am.
More than 2,000 students and teachers of the school stood in silent tribute to extend condolences to those killed in the bloody tragedy.
"Please don't be scared. We'll always protect you," teachers told the students through loudspeakers, and then gave each student a warm hug.
"I feel so sad that many lovely young lives have gone," said a teacher surnamed Shi.
The first two classes were focused on psychological therapies, including video education and questions and answers aimed at helping the students cope with the tragedy.
In a special notice designed for the deceased classmates, Cai Chengyi, 11, wrote "we will try to step out of the shadow of the killing spree and brace the future with an optimistic spirit."
Chen Jixiong, one of the psychologists working at the school, assumed it would take two to three months for the children to fully recover from the mental trauma.
Zheng Minsheng, a former community doctor in Nanping city, attacked 13 children at the entrance of the school Tuesday morning when crowds of students were arriving, leaving eight dead and five injured.
Two of the injured were in stable condition Wednesday while the three others were confined to intensive care and were undergoing emergency treatment, said Liu Bin, an officer with Nanping's health bureau.
One of them suffered a high fever, vital lung injuries and blood circulation problems, said Chen Xiaojie, vice president of the No.1 Hospital of Nanping.
The provincial health administration has sent three medical teams to Nanping, including five chest surgeons and three intensive care nurses. A senior doctor has just arrived also.
Classes ended half an hour earlier than usual on Wednesday afternoon and parents who were waiting outside for their kids almost paralyzed the traffic in the area at rush hour.
Yan Zhenhui, a man in his 60s who witnessed the killing a day ago, took his daughter-in-law to accompany his two granddaughters home Wednesday.
"The girls were so frightened that they kept crying yesterday at home. I plan to take them to and from school every day in the future," he said.
Police are investigating the incident.
