teaching kids that they are nothing more than modified pond scum IMO is more damaging than teaching them they are the creation of a loving God.

Two things here. First, there is nothing more damaging than teaching kids that myth is true. The crucial thing is to teach kids what is true, and to teach them how to separate truth from myth. In other words, to teach them how to find evidence and how to assess it using reason. If the truth ends up being a little uncomfortable, well so be it. Incidentally, if you scrape out some of that pond scum and dress your vegetable beds with it, you will get superb and abundant produce, showing that pond scum can indeed bring forth new life and bring it forth abundantly! Second, I thought the whole drift of Christian teaching is that we are in any case all hopeless, miserable pond scum who can only be saved by the blood of Jesus.