my primary concern as a parent right now would be to ensure that my children do not become habituated to covering their faces in public, and that they don't develop the bad habit of putting faith in an idea over the realities of empirical science.

you may have faith in the idea of cloth face coverings reducing spread, but that's exactly what you're being conditioned to, and that's exactly why you need to pull the rug out from under the idea altogether.