TWO knife-wielding men yesterday assaulted a female grade six teacher in front of her students at the Dunrobin Primary School in St Andrew, leaving the nearly 40 children severely traumatised.

The teacher, according to one student, was hit repeatedly in the face, kicked in the throat and stabbed at as she fell. She was admitted to hospital up to press time last night.

"The knife caught her on her lip and she fell to the ground and was bleeding," a student told the Jamaica Observer.

The incident occurred at approximately 9:30 am while the teacher was going through the day's lesson with her students.

"We heard loud screams coming from the classroom and then we heard the students calling out the teacher's name," the student related.

Chaos ensued on the grade six block as frightened students dashed from their classrooms while teachers rushed to ascertain what was happening.

The teacher was found on the classroom floor, unconscious and with blood streaming from her face.

Students said the men ran to the back of the school, and later proceeded towards Red Hills Road.

"We saw them. The two of them running away," a student told the Observer.

The incident saw nervous parents rushing to the school to collect their children.

"We do not know what is behind the attack but it has left us in fear. Can you imagine is at school dem (attackers) come?" said one parent, who was standing at the school gate.

The incident follows last Friday's attack and murder of a teacher by a mob in Old Harbour, St Catherine.

Forty-one-year-old Michael Melbourne, who headed the Computer Sciences Department at Old Harbour High, was stabbed, chopped and beaten to death after the mini bus he was driving mowed down several residents who was tending to a man who was the victim of a hit-and-run only moments before.

Yesterday, the Jamaica Teachers' Association (JTA) said the daring Dunrobin incident reinforced the need for Government to invest more in security at public schools.

"It is quite unfortunate that these situations continue to recur while we continue to ask for them," said a concerned JTA President Clayton Hall.

"We are at this point hoping that we do not get to a situation where a teacher loses his or her life, God forbid, in the presence of the students, before we take a careful look as to how we secure our schools, how we secure our teachers, [and] how we secure our students," said Adams.

Meanwhile, investigators up to late yesterday could not give a motive for the attack.

"We have received the reports and at this time we are carrying out our investigations," said Superintendent Derrick Knight, head of the St Andrew South Police Division.