On Friday, Mayor Bill de Blasio said not as many students had enrolled in the program as “we would have expected.”

He attributed that to the general fear and confusion of life amid a pandemic, as well as the large numbers of people staying home from work, which offered some parents other child care options. Either way, he said, there was “certainly plenty of room” at the centers.

“They’re there for essential workers,” he said. “So, here’s what it comes down to — so long as the essential worker, if they’ve got a better arrangement, that’s fine. We just need to support them to make sure they can show up and doing the lifesaving work they’re doing.”

Still, some found the sight of near-empty classrooms to be jarring. A cafeteria worker at one center at P.S. 125 in Harlem, where the playground was empty and the halls were pin-drop quiet, said school employees far outnumbered children on Tuesday. Over the course of nearly an hour, only one child could be seen when her mother arrived to take her home.

“There are barely any kids in there,” said the cafeteria worker, who declined to be publicly named because she was not authorized to speak to the news media. “One classroom might have just one kid in it, one classroom might have three kids, most of the classrooms have no kids.”

A similar scene could be found at an enrichment center at P.S. 19 in the Corona section of Queens, where employees said between five and 10 students showed up on Tuesday. At another center on West 120th Street in Harlem, a security guard said the school was mostly empty.