On Monday, the day after the election, pupils were at school, but in some Sofia schools there were no normal lessons. In others the day ran like any school day. Quite a few parents kept their children at home.
On 9 October, education minister Prof Georgi Valchev ordered 26 October to be a non-teaching day for all pupils in Bulgaria, but one when they still had to attend. Schools had polling stations, and the rooms had to be ready again for classes. Under the order, teachers do not cover new material but go over what pupils have already learned.
What happened before this: Pupils will be at school on 26 October, but without regular lessons
Some Sofia schools quickly set the rooms in order and worked as usual. Others replaced lessons with activities outside the school curriculum.
At School No 51 "Elisaveta Bagryana", teachers came in early to get the rooms back in shape after election day, and the day followed the timetable. Head teacher Veselin Stefanov told BNT about the guidance: "not to teach new knowledge, but to reinforce what has already been learned".
Fourth-graders in class 4 "A" held a handwriting contest and took part in a few other activities, then drew and coloured pictures. Their class teacher said it is one of the children's favourite days, because there are no standard lessons and they are all together. The pupils said they were enjoying the day and having a lot of fun.
At School No 119, fewer children came than expected. Deputy head for primary grades Viktoria Raeva said pupils filled only about 4 classes' worth of seats in the building, and that those who came were having fun and doing different things.
Nine-year-olds in class 3 "V" worked on the school's project about virtues. With their teacher, they discussed what a virtue is and looked for stories with a lesson in fairy-tale books, then drew pictures of Vasil Levski. The teacher called the day free and relaxed. She said children usually have a very heavy workload, and today is more fun for them.
One pupil told BNT: "Let there be one day like this every week and we study on the other days."
The Bulgarian language teacher asked the class to draw a comic in groups. One group's theme was "the break-time monster".