Paul Dix

Paul Dix is a behaviour specialist, author, education reformer and advisor who has been helping teachers and headteachers across the world with transformational relational behaviour practice.

Based in the United Kingdom, Dix has advised the Department for Education on Teacher Standards, given evidence to the Education Select Committee and has done extensive work with the Ministry of Justice on Behaviour and Restraint in Youth Custody. He is a National Training Award Winner and writes for both the Times Educational supplement and Teach Primary Magazine.

Paul fell in love with teaching while working as a Teaching Assistant after leaving school. Teaching both inspired and drew him in due to the creativity, the variety and the cohort after cohort of utterly brilliant children he encountered. He taught in schools surrounded by poverty in London, Nuneaton and Birmingham across all ages. Paul was commended for leading school behaviour policy and practice through intensive inspection. 

Paul has delivered training and spoken on large stages all over the world; his book ‘When The Adults Change, Everything Changes’, published in 2017, has sold more than 150,000 copies.

How are we inspired at Hazeldown?

After reading Paul’s book, ‘When The Adults Change, Everything Changes’, we were inspired to adapt our approach to dealing with behaviour so that our updated behaviour policy was centred around two aspects: visible consistency and visible kindness. This involved making our behaviour management even more positive through the use of strategies such as positive framing and recognition boards.

Paul’s work reinforces the message presented by one of our other inspirations – Rita Pierson: that positive adult: pupil relationships are key; within his book, he references the impact of ‘deliberate botheredness’ from school staff members as well as the importance of having consistent routines and expectations that are utterly predictable for children. Reading the aforementioned book inspired us to introduce consistent adult scripts for dealing with situations as well as encouraging pupils to understand the impact of their behaviour on others and the need to ‘repair’ after making mistakes.