More than seven-thousand schools in the Seoul metropolitan area will resume limited offline classes on Monday in line with a recent slowdown in new COVID-19 cases.

The Education Ministry said kindergartens, as well as elementary, middle and high schools in the greater Seoul area will mix online and offline classes from Monday.

The move will be enforced until October 11. 

According to the ministry, the affected schools - two-thousand in Seoul, 800 in Incheon, and 42-hundred in Gyeonggi Province - account for about 40 percent of the nation's schools. 

Under the Level Two guidelines, schools are required to operate with attendance capped at one-third in kindergartens, elementary and middle schools and two-thirds in high schools. 

High school seniors, who have been attending offline classes every day for the national college entrance exam slated for December, will also join the mixed approach of offline and remote learning from Monday.  

Schools in the metropolitan area had switched to online classes on August 26 amid a spike in COVID-19 cases in the region. High school seniors were not subject to that policy.

However, the government decided to allow schools to mix online and offline classes as health authorities eased the so-called Level Two-point-Five social distancing to Level Two last week.