"Terrorists blew up a car bomb near the primary school in the town of Omm al-Amd in the countryside outside Homs, killing five schoolchildren and two workers," the official SANA news agency reported.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists and medics on the ground, confirmed the blast and said it killed five people and wounded others.
The watchdog said that Omm al-Amd is home to a Shiite community close to the Alawite sect of President Bashar al-Assad, unlike the majority Sunni Muslim rebels fighting to topple him.