'When the adults change, everything changes' with Paul Dix Naylor's Natter Podcast 'Just talking to Teachers'

Welcome to this weeks Naylor’s Natter . This week is a special episode that I have been sitting on for some time. As you will all know , I was due to help host with my colleague Mr Simon Cox the behemoth that is rED Blackpool. At this conference , I was due to speak about behaviour , not because I am some kind of expert but because I am a student of behaviour . I would like to think that after years of honing my own behaviour management that I am stronger in this area than at any stage of my career. I attribute this to learning from and listening to many of the big voices in behaviour over 20 years .

I started by learning from Lee Canter’s assertive discipline and this was a book I re-read each and every August before returning to school. I also discovered the behavior guru Bill Rogers and read many of Bill’s books and devoured his videos. The talk I referred to earlier was entitled ‘Behaviour- Ideology, evidence and pragmatism’ . Behaviour more than any other issue in school is highly controversial and teachers and leaders have many and varied styles and rationales for the behaviour policy they adopt . Teachers and leaders seem to have a strong position on their preferred behaviour approach and some seem to favour a particular camp or approach . This is very much teacher’s own choice and I fully understand that teachers are attached to their own particular style or strategy . The strap line for this podcast is talking to teacher and this is very much a philosophy that we at Naylor’s natter want to promote. On the podcast we have spoken to Sam Strickland, Tom Bennett , Kiran Gill , Jules Daulby and many other on their philosophy of behaviour . What hopefully listeners will find is that whatever your preferred style  , there is something to be gained from listening to everyone in the debate on behaviour .

This week’s guest is Paul Dix. Paul has written the hugely successful ‘When the adults change, everything changes’ and is an experienced teacher and a leading voice in education . What struck me in our pre-lockdown February half-term conversation is how much great advice for teachers there is within this book and how practical its application can be . Paul speaks humbly about his own practice in the classroom , his rationale for writing the book to help teachers like himself and how reading this book many change your view of how you approach behaviour but also of his approach . Lot’s of the debate on social media is quite binary , this approach is good that one isn’t . This behaviour expert is right , this one is wrong and the levels of praise or vitriol can be off putting particularly with new teachers.

This is a podcast to approach with an open mind , there will be something for you here whatever your current view on behaviour . You will hopefully see as I did , the common themes coming through from all the podcasts we have done on behaviour . I found Paul utterly charming and giving of his time and whilst I wont adopt everything we discussed , he really made me think about how to refine my own practice and that of the school . Thank you Paul

We have our regular TDT section which this week is anything but regular as we have leadership legend and friend of the show Jill Berry back to talk about leadership. In podcast pedagogy this week I am reading the researched guide to the curriculum – an evidence informed guide for teachers edited by Claire Sealey who I will be speaking to soon about this new John Catt book . I am also revisiting retrieval practice – research and resources for every classroom from the wonderful Kate Jones .