Q:

"statt dass" is not good German?

I saw this sentence in a DaF grammar exercise book:

Statt dass wir hier lange Erklärungen geben, sollten wir lieber mit den Übungen anfangen.

I found the structure very interesting, so I googled it. And I found a discussion on one of the language forums where a couple of people expressed their opinion and said that "statt dass" doesn't sound very good in German.
They recommend rephrasing it into "statt ... zu..." structure. So I guess it would be something like: "Statt hier lange Erklärungen zu geben..."
Is that true? Then why would they include it in a textbook for someone who learns German as a second language?

A:

Using "Statt dass" would be quite the same as using "'stead of" in English. It wouldn't be wrong, but it would also be a bit sloppy. I would recommend "Anstatt lange Erklärungen zu geben, sollten wir lieber mit den Übungen anfangen." which would mean "instead of giving long explanations…".
Or, an alternative that would also be nice: "Anstelle langer Erklärungen" ["In place of long explanations [where the meaning of "long" would be in the direction of exhausting]  …"

