BY TOM DUBOCQ AND PETER WHORISKEY

 Morning bells rang as usual Tuesday, but in droves, students and teachers ignored the call.

 More than 115,000 Miami-Dade public school students -- about one in three -- missed class, most because of the general strike over the Elian Gonzalez raid, officials said.

 More than 3,900 teachers -- 20 percent of the district staff -- failed to show.

 A strike by the county's fleet of guaguitas -- privately operated vans and buses -- stranded thousands of students as well.

 ''It's dead, very dead,'' said Maria Punongbayan, a senior at Miami High School, where about four of every five students were absent. ''Most of the teachers didn't come, either.''

 School officials said 115,419 children, 32 percent of the student enrollment, were absent. Typically, 7 percent of students miss any given day.

 The most deeply affected schools were in central Miami-Dade and Hialeah, said Deputy Superintendent Carol Cortes:

 In the Hialeah region, 28,400 students, or 45 percent of the population, were out.

 In Little Havana and central Dade, 43,400, or 42 percent, missed.

 In the Kendall region, 25,300, or 38 percent, were out.

 Less affected were the north and south ends of the county. In deep South Dade 11,000 of or 21 percent of the students were absent. In northern Dade, 5,358 or 11 percent of students were out.

 MOST SINCE ANDREW

 It was a strange, lost day at the most heavily-impacted schools. Not since Hurricane Andrew have students stayed away from school in such large numbers. In hundreds of classrooms, teachers facing dozens of empty seats scrapped lesson plans in favor of games or review, delaying the presentation of new topics until all students were in attendance.

 ''Teachers didn't want to introduce new material with one-third of the class gone,'' explained Bill Kinney, principal at David Fairchild Elementary, where about 175 of 606 students were absent. ''But one day doesn't affect the whole program.''

 Most students at Miami High were sent to the auditorium -- either their teachers were absent or there were deemed too few to teach -- and shown movies: The Matrix, a sci-fi film starring Keanu Reeves, The Sixth Sense, a horror film and Stuart Little, about a mouse voiced by Michael J. Fox.

 Killian High administrators had to fill in for the striking kitchen crew, dishing out grilled cheese sandwiches and roast pork to bemused students.

 And at Hialeah High School, so many kids were absent that the attendance computer crashed, said principal Carmen Maristany. She said at least 60 percent of the students were marked absent.

 ''We have a high percentage of students who crossed the waters in rafts,'' Maristany said. ''For them, there are a lot of emotional aspects to this. It is an issue that is very close and dear to their hearts.''

 LINCOLN-MARTI CLOSED

 Lincoln-Marti, the private school Elian attended while living in Little Havana, was shut down for the strike. School Board member Demetrio Perez, whose family runs the school, said his classmates had planned an Easter party, which was canceled.

 ''The children signed an Easter card for him,'' Perez said. ''We are going to try to mail it to him at his new address.''

 West Kendall parent Idalia Laso stayed home, too, with her children -- ages 6, 9 and 11. She said Elian's situation was particularly painful for her because he and her son, Angel, are the same age.

 ''My little one was very upset when he saw what happened at Elian's house,'' she said. ''He wanted to know why they did that to a little boy, and why it was bad to be taken to his father.

 ''I told him how there was no food and that to us, Elian will never be with his father, he will be with Fidel Castro.''

 Even some teachers who worked on Tuesday showed support for the strike. About a dozen Cuban-American teachers at David Fairchild Elementary wore funereal black to register their dismay at Saturday's raid.

 ''This way we demonstrate our feelings without being disruptive in our children's lives,'' said Nydia Aragon, a second-grade teacher.

 While public school buses operated normally, thousands of kids who normally take private buses were left without transportation because hundreds of bus drivers supported the strike. Sara Quintero, president of the Miami-based School Bus Owners Association, said most of the group's 600 members are Cuban American. There are roughly 1,000 licensed private school buses operating in Miami-Dade -- and most were out of service Tuesday.

 Two sixth-graders at Kinloch Park Middle School spent the day wandering around the neighborhood carrying a large American flag upside down.

 ''Well, we're against America,'' said Johan Enriquez, a Mickey Mouse hat pulled low over his brow.

 ''Well, we're not against  America, we're just against what Clinton did,'' explained his friend Alex Rodriguez.

 ''Even though we're two sixth-graders, we think we can make a difference,'' Enriquez said.

 Herald Writers Mindy Hagen and Diana Marrero contributed to this report.

                     Copyright 2000 Miami Herald