Mentality Education for Children in Egypt's Contemporary Fiction: Case Study of Kamel Kilani’ The Merchant of Baghdad using Lipman's Theory

The story The Merchant of Baghdad is Kamel Kilani’s work (1897-1959), a contemporary Egyptian writer and thinker. In this work, Kilani uses story and narrative elements as a tool for teaching thought and philosophy for children. The main purpose of this descriptive-analytical research was to analyze the elements using ancient stories in Kamel Kilani’s work and applying Matthew Lipman’s components. The philosophy plan for children, founded by Lipman, tries to fulfill the essential needs of young audiences; teaching them how to think, reason, and criticize, asking about the nature and cause of phenomena, teaching how to apply what has been learned at the right time and place, receiving the answer after thinking, and considering and understanding the logical relation between the phenomena by using the story. He prevents the children and young adults from thinking dogmatically and not paying attention to others’ opinions. In the process of the story, they learn to challenge the groundwork and test the reasoning and look for the realities. The findings also indicate that Kilani has tried to design the style and content of this story for teaching creative and critical thinking. The story uses games and conversations. Children have independent characteristics in this story. The judge’s judgments are challenged and the truth is proved by logical reasoning. There seems a kind of alignment between Kilani’s writing style and Lipman’s theory. They both consider the stories as the basis of teaching. They mention and challenge the essential life problems. Children will learn how to analyze, challenge and conceptualize in this story by playing roles.