Rahat Zaidi
Biographic Data
| ID | 1185332 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Rahat Zaidi |
| GIVEN NAMES | Rahat |
| FAMILY NAME | Zaidi |
| SIGNATURE | ZAIDI R |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Calgary |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-2989-6675 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 13 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 2 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 13 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2020 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Literacy Learning and Multicultural Education
The surge in global immigration has resulted in a significant increase in multilingual/multicultural families, and these demographic changes provide a focused and exciting opportunity to explore some of the educational ramification of these changes. To this point, schools are heeding research's call for a renewed examination of foundational policies, curricula, and instructional methods that have long served a predominantly homogenous demographic…
Text quality evaluation of children’s Russian/English dual-language books
Dual-language books have been gaining popularity in both home and school settings. The books are entirely written in two languages and may be used to support bilingual children’s literacy development. In this study, researchers evaluated 18 Russian/ English dual-language books from one elementary school library in Calgary, Canada. The study evaluated the books in accordance with such as text appearance, language effects, book information, transla…
Analyzing Newcomer Narratives in a Student-Produced Video on Integration Challenges
This study sought to empower the perspectives of racial minority adolescent students by creating an opportunity to advocate for themselves and to seek change in the community they live in. The study took place in a highly diverse rural high school in Western Canada and included creating a social media advocacy campaign that addressed the challenges faced by these students. The researchers used Rose’s four sites for interpreting visual materials, …
Disrupting intersectional inequalities for English language learners in Canadian schools
Despite Canada’s longstanding commitment to multiculturalism and diversity, systemic inequalities continue to shape the educational experiences of English Language Learners (ELLs), particularly at the intersection of language, race, religion, and gender. This special issue of the International Multilingual Research Journal critically interrogates how these intersecting identities contribute to structural barriers that impede ELLs’ academic succes…
“Just make them feel welcomed”
This study examines the role of multilingual and multimodal literacy engagement in supporting the integration of newcomer students, emphasizing digital technologies and diverse multimodal texts. Utilizing a workshop methodology, the interactive and participatory research process empowered participants to use their home language, culture, and religion to influence their English language learning and social integration while contributing their pers…
Critically Engaged Language and Literacy Workshops as a Disruptive Pedagogy in Plurilingual Classrooms
This study explored racialized newcomer student participants' experiences in a rural high school in Western Canada, and utilized critically engaged language and literacy workshops (CELLWs) as a means to authentically represent participants' interrelationships with and relatability to their school and community spaces. CELLWs are an important avenue for self‐reflection that fosters socially just, diverse, and equitable educational practices. Under…
We Are Looking to Each Other, Waiting to Understand
Research has underlined the importance of communicative competence in order for newcomers to succeed and build resilience in their adopted homeland. Studies on this topic, however, have generally assumed the primacy of linguistic competence as the principal locus of investigation without paying due attention to the nuances of how new immigrants use “spatial repertoires” – interactive assemblages of people, objects, language, and environment – in …
Critical Language Awareness in Motion
One of the primary challenges for multilingual students in Canada is to learn English and integrate into mainstream society. Within this process, students’ intersectional identities (the intersection of race, language, culture, and religion) influence their L2 learning while creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination and disadvantage. This article explores “multilingual awareness” and its interplay with “spatial awareness” …
Affordances of Multilingual and Multimodal Literacy Engagements of Immigrant High School Students
This article presents a scoping review of literacy research that employs multilingual and multimodal literacy narratives and discussions as tools for enabling immigrant youth to explore their intersectional identities and experiences of inequality. It encourages a re-examination of emerging educational/societal issues, incorporating these interventions as a catalyst for discussion. Utilizing a descriptive-analytic approach for data extraction, th…
Beyond Covid-19
Immigrant and newcomer students often experience challenges as they seek to assimilate in the new country. As such, this theme remains significantly under-researched and continues to hinder our understanding of newcomer students’ most urgent needs. This article focuses on the perspectives given by newcomer high school students as they discuss, through open dialogue and social media, their main challenges living in a new country. The scholars empl…
Behind Successful Refugee Parental Engagement
This two-year study examined the barriers and challenges encountered by refugee parents as they negotiate their children’s successful transition into a new school system. The researchers sought to determine what can be learned from parent and educator experiences of these obstacles in order to optimize parent–teacher collaboration for refugee families. Contextualized within a LEAD (Literacy, English and Academic Development) program in an urban c…
The understated role of pedagogical love and human emotion in refugee education
This study sought to determine the role pedagogical love can play in the emotional experience of (Arabic-speaking) refugee families in Calgary, Canada, as they engaged with the public education system at the Grade 4–12 level. Through a cooperative inquiry approach, based on a shared agenda and interests, the researchers used cycles of action and reflection to elicit and analyse the experiences of parents, teachers, and in-school support workers. …
Dual-Language Books
This collaborative action research project in Alberta, Canada, explored how dual-language books (DLBs) can foster literacy instruction and learner engagement through language awareness. Canada’s changing demographics have resulted in mother tongue diversity and many urban schools identifying at least 25% of students as being English language learners, making it crucial to include a mix of languages in classroom interactions to engage all learners…
Beyond Covid-19
Immigrant and newcomer students often experience challenges as they seek to assimilate in the new country. As such, this theme remains significantly under-researched and continues to hinder our understanding of newcomer students’ most urgent needs. This article focuses on the perspectives given by newcomer high school students as they discuss, through open dialogue and social media, their main challenges living in a new country. The scholars empl…
The understated role of pedagogical love and human emotion in refugee education
This study sought to determine the role pedagogical love can play in the emotional experience of (Arabic-speaking) refugee families in Calgary, Canada, as they engaged with the public education system at the Grade 4–12 level. Through a cooperative inquiry approach, based on a shared agenda and interests, the researchers used cycles of action and reflection to elicit and analyse the experiences of parents, teachers, and in-school support workers. …
Dual-Language Books
This collaborative action research project in Alberta, Canada, explored how dual-language books (DLBs) can foster literacy instruction and learner engagement through language awareness. Canada’s changing demographics have resulted in mother tongue diversity and many urban schools identifying at least 25% of students as being English language learners, making it crucial to include a mix of languages in classroom interactions to engage all learners…
Behind Successful Refugee Parental Engagement
This two-year study examined the barriers and challenges encountered by refugee parents as they negotiate their children’s successful transition into a new school system. The researchers sought to determine what can be learned from parent and educator experiences of these obstacles in order to optimize parent–teacher collaboration for refugee families. Contextualized within a LEAD (Literacy, English and Academic Development) program in an urban c…
The understated role of pedagogical love and human emotion in refugee education
This study sought to determine the role pedagogical love can play in the emotional experience of (Arabic-speaking) refugee families in Calgary, Canada, as they engaged with the public education system at the Grade 4–12 level. Through a cooperative inquiry approach, based on a shared agenda and interests, the researchers used cycles of action and reflection to elicit and analyse the experiences of parents, teachers, and in-school support workers. …
Affordances of Multilingual and Multimodal Literacy Engagements of Immigrant High School Students
This article presents a scoping review of literacy research that employs multilingual and multimodal literacy narratives and discussions as tools for enabling immigrant youth to explore their intersectional identities and experiences of inequality. It encourages a re-examination of emerging educational/societal issues, incorporating these interventions as a catalyst for discussion. Utilizing a descriptive-analytic approach for data extraction, th…
Beyond Covid-19
Immigrant and newcomer students often experience challenges as they seek to assimilate in the new country. As such, this theme remains significantly under-researched and continues to hinder our understanding of newcomer students’ most urgent needs. This article focuses on the perspectives given by newcomer high school students as they discuss, through open dialogue and social media, their main challenges living in a new country. The scholars empl…
Analyzing Newcomer Narratives in a Student-Produced Video on Integration Challenges
This study sought to empower the perspectives of racial minority adolescent students by creating an opportunity to advocate for themselves and to seek change in the community they live in. The study took place in a highly diverse rural high school in Western Canada and included creating a social media advocacy campaign that addressed the challenges faced by these students. The researchers used Rose’s four sites for interpreting visual materials, …
Disrupting intersectional inequalities for English language learners in Canadian schools
Despite Canada’s longstanding commitment to multiculturalism and diversity, systemic inequalities continue to shape the educational experiences of English Language Learners (ELLs), particularly at the intersection of language, race, religion, and gender. This special issue of the International Multilingual Research Journal critically interrogates how these intersecting identities contribute to structural barriers that impede ELLs’ academic succes…
“Just make them feel welcomed”
This study examines the role of multilingual and multimodal literacy engagement in supporting the integration of newcomer students, emphasizing digital technologies and diverse multimodal texts. Utilizing a workshop methodology, the interactive and participatory research process empowered participants to use their home language, culture, and religion to influence their English language learning and social integration while contributing their pers…
Critically Engaged Language and Literacy Workshops as a Disruptive Pedagogy in Plurilingual Classrooms
This study explored racialized newcomer student participants' experiences in a rural high school in Western Canada, and utilized critically engaged language and literacy workshops (CELLWs) as a means to authentically represent participants' interrelationships with and relatability to their school and community spaces. CELLWs are an important avenue for self‐reflection that fosters socially just, diverse, and equitable educational practices. Under…
We Are Looking to Each Other, Waiting to Understand
Research has underlined the importance of communicative competence in order for newcomers to succeed and build resilience in their adopted homeland. Studies on this topic, however, have generally assumed the primacy of linguistic competence as the principal locus of investigation without paying due attention to the nuances of how new immigrants use “spatial repertoires” – interactive assemblages of people, objects, language, and environment – in …
Critical Language Awareness in Motion
One of the primary challenges for multilingual students in Canada is to learn English and integrate into mainstream society. Within this process, students’ intersectional identities (the intersection of race, language, culture, and religion) influence their L2 learning while creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination and disadvantage. This article explores “multilingual awareness” and its interplay with “spatial awareness” …
Literacy Learning and Multicultural Education
The surge in global immigration has resulted in a significant increase in multilingual/multicultural families, and these demographic changes provide a focused and exciting opportunity to explore some of the educational ramification of these changes. To this point, schools are heeding research's call for a renewed examination of foundational policies, curricula, and instructional methods that have long served a predominantly homogenous demographic…
Text quality evaluation of children’s Russian/English dual-language books
Dual-language books have been gaining popularity in both home and school settings. The books are entirely written in two languages and may be used to support bilingual children’s literacy development. In this study, researchers evaluated 18 Russian/ English dual-language books from one elementary school library in Calgary, Canada. The study evaluated the books in accordance with such as text appearance, language effects, book information, transla…
Pedagogy (8 works) · Psychology (8 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Literacy (5 works) · Multilingual Education and Policy (5 works) · Political science (4 works) · Gender Studies (3 works) · Immigration (3 works) · Linguistics (3 works) · Literacy, Media, and Education (3 works)