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A came across this article on addictinginfo.org. It quotes from this article in the Scotland Herald, describing Accelerated Christian Education in Louisiana. I quote:

One ACE textbook – Biology 1099, Accelerated Christian Education Inc – reads: "Are dinosaurs alive today? Scientists are becoming more convinced of their existence. Have you heard of the 'Loch Ness Monster' in Scotland? 'Nessie' for short has been recorded on sonar from a small submarine, described by eyewitnesses, and photographed by others. Nessie appears to be a plesiosaur."

There are other sources on the web, such as Huffington Post, but ultimately they all seem to echo the same source from the Scotland Herald, and it wouldn't be the first time that a worldwide media buzz all echo an initially incorrect source.

I want to disbelieve this. Is this really taught to schoolchildren in Louisiana?

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    Are dinosaurs alive today? No, but some of their direct descendants are alive today, they are called birds!
    – Sam I Am
    Commented Jan 21, 2013 at 14:57
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    When I was in school, I was taught blood is blue, the United States is the the only country in the world to have elections, we have no idea why the dinosaurs went extinct, England and the UK are different names for the same country, as well as a number of other blatantly false things.
    – Sam I Am
    Commented Jan 21, 2013 at 15:04
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    @DVK, counter-question. What's worse; a teacher saying something that's nonsense, or a school curriculum writing down many things that are nonsense?
    – gerrit
    Commented Jan 22, 2013 at 21:46
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    @DVK Perhaps, but my point was that a single teacher (now suspended) is a less wide-spread problem than a commonly used curriculum. E.g., severity multiplied by spread.
    – gerrit
    Commented Jan 22, 2013 at 22:36
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    @DVK I'm sure one can find horribly incompetent teachers teaching all kind of nonsense (including political) in all corners of the political spectrum. However, I am highly skeptical to your claim that most of them think this way.
    – gerrit
    Commented Jan 22, 2013 at 22:55

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Without being able to scan in the page (or pages) in question I don't know if I can give you a definitive answer. The Table of contents of the book does list that dinosaurs are discussed on page 28. If you page through the book, it is a very, very skewed view of pretty much everything in there, slanted towards the creationist viewpoint (the preview only goes to page 5). I suppose I could waste the $3.30 to find out, but this level of silliness is not worthy of a single penny from me.

A christian site itself repeats this story. Remember, the level of absolute denial of evidence and (I will opine) crazy required to accept literal creationism is probably foreign to most people. The lengths of the lies they will go to to promote their bronze age fairy tales sadly do not surprise me in the slightest. Sadly, there are kids in Louisiana (and other places) that do get lied to on such a grand and gross scale (yes, they even deny nuclear fusion is happening in the sun...). This interview discusses some of the "finer" points of this type of education.

the students have to work in silence in these cubicles that they make for them, and there’s no social interaction. I think that educationally it’s quite damaging. They’re not allowed to question anything. I think that the purpose of education has to be to learn how to find stuff out for yourself. You can’t do that if you’re telling children, “No, this is all that you’re allowed to know, and this is all that you’re allowed to think.”

Keep in mind, these books are specifically marketed to homeschooling christians, and christian schools that currently are not part of the publicly funded education system. As such, they should not be in the public schools, although given the behaviour of legislators in Louisiana, I think many wish these books were in there.

Keep in mind, these books are not only in Louisiana. As the interview link states:

Accelerated Christian Education is a fundamentalist curriculum that started in Texas, and now it’s used in more than 5,000 schools around the world. Australia is one of the bigger, busier clients for accelerated Christian education outside of the U.S.

Yes, I weep for the poor children that are getting cheated of a reality based education.

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    Can we may be tone down the insulting tone, especially coming from a moderator?
    – user5341
    Commented Jan 22, 2013 at 0:14
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    @DVK Normally I would give the benefit of the doubt to most woo woo, but this particular brand of incredulous idiocy deserves outright mocking of the most severe sort. Trust me, I held back from expressing the level of mental castration that one must perform to even remotely adhere to this level of idiocy (and I am still holding back!).
    – Larian LeQuella
    Commented Jan 22, 2013 at 2:02
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    @Coomie I think there are many much more likely and rational explanations. :) Would make for a good question though!
    – Larian LeQuella
    Commented Jan 23, 2013 at 1:56
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    @Coomie Considering the fact that plenty of myths have creatures that do not resemble any living and/or extinct animals and also the fact that Unicorns are very horse like while having never existed, i agree absolutely with Larian LeQuella. See also Argument from ignorance and Confirmation bias
    – Stefan
    Commented Jan 23, 2013 at 14:53
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    @Coomie How about this more plausible explanation: fossils are actually findable by many people, pre-scientific peoples found them, and made up fanciful stories to fit these unknown findings? Sound more familiar and probable, since ALL evidence shows that humans and dinosaurs are separated by 65 Million years (with the exception of their descendants, the birds).
    – Larian LeQuella
    Commented Jan 24, 2013 at 1:43

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