NGARUA, Kenya — When Nelly Chepchumba returned to school this week, she found charred walls where her classroom used to be and two corpses half-buried in the garden. A place of learning had been consumed in the explosion of violence that followed a disputed presidential election in Kenya.

Thirteen-year-old Nelly poked through the grounds for old uniforms and missing shoes. She stepped over ripped-up spelling books. Old attendance sheets and a blackboard with the message "Don't hesitate to discipline children. A good spanking won't kill them!" served as reminders of the students who used to gather.

"I'm jealous of other children who get to return to their classes," Nelly said, standing in where her front-row seat used to be. "I fear I will forget all my lessons."

After weeks of violence, thousands of children cannot return to school because their classrooms were burned or looted or are housing refugees.

The Ministry of Education, which ordered schools to reopen this week, had no immediate estimate last Thursday on how many children were missing school. But the UN children's agency said the conflict has displaced 100,000 children, and some 75,000 were still living in camps that have sprung up in churches, police stations and show grounds.

The election returned Mwai Kibaki to power for a second five-year term, with official results putting Raila Odinga second in the closest presidential race in Kenya's history. But foreign and local election observers have said the vote count was deeply flawed. Although the electoral chief pronounced Kibaki the victor, he later said he had been pressured to do so and did not know who won.

Efforts at international mediation have failed so far.

Some parents said they were keeping their children home the three days the opposition has called for rallies across the country this week. During the protests, which started last Wednesday, stone-throwing demonstrators clashed with police firing bullets and tear gas.

On Thursday, just outside Nelly's hometown of Ngarua, young men were stopping trucks, robbing the drivers and then parking the empty vehicles across main roads to serve as roadblocks.

"We are not letting our children out of our sight," said Tabitha Wanjiru, a parent in Ngarua. "Besides, the sight of decomposing bodies will be traumatizing for our children."

The bloodshed across Kenya, from Nairobi to the coast and the rural highlands, has marked some of the darkest times since Kenya's independence from Britain in 1963. Much of the fighting degenerated into riots pitting other tribes against Kibaki's Kikuyu, long dominant in Kenyan politics and the economy.

In Ngarua, some 200 miles from the capital, hundreds of Kikuyus were hiding in Nelly's school when a mob torched it on December 30, the day election results were announced. Most escaped, according to witnesses, although several said six had died, including the two whose bodies Nelly saw.

Nicholas Arusei, 28, was among those who stormed the school, armed with arrows, machetes and flaming torches. He said Kikuyus had attacked him in the past, and they didn't deserve shelter because their candidate had stolen the vote.

But "it's painful now, because I can see the losses," Arusei said. "The regret, it comes later."

Caroline Tundanai, 25, whose 6-year-old son attended Ngarua school, said she understood the anger behind the attack, highlighting the ferocity of the tribal resentments in the area.

"The Kikuyus were expecting to live here," said Tundanai, a member of the Kalenjin tribe, which supports the opposition. "We didn't want them to hide here."

Local officials said they were planning to raze the looted school.

Sylvester Mulambe, the district education officer, said officials were working to set up temporary schools in displacement camps, or to register students at schools in other towns.

Nelly was planning to travel six miles to a new school every day — starting yesterday, after the protests were over.

"My mother told me I will have to walk to that school," she said. "And I will walk that distance, even if it's far."