When some animals show their teeth, it can mean they want to fight or it can mean they don’t want to fight! When we show our teeth, we are usually smiling so it means we are happy or we are having a photograph taken! Say cheese..

Have you ever noticed that if you smile at someone, they smile right back at you? Have you also noticed how if someone smiles at you then you smile back at them, without even thinking about it?

What does this tell you about smiling?

Smiling is contagious so spread it around! A smile shows you are friendly and that you’re a fun, nice person to be with and it can help you make friends.

Your brain controls everything you do, from thinking to talking. It is connected to the rest of the body with the help of the nervous system.
Nerves carry messages to and from the brain to other parts of the body.

Let’s see what happens when you see someone you know and you smile at them:

1) First, you see the person, so sensory nerves carry a message from your eyes to your brain for processing.

2) Your brain processes the message and concludes that the person is familiar.

3) Your brain then sends instructions to smile at the person, which are carried along the nerves to certain muscles in your face.

Different facial muscles are used for showing anger, sadness, surprise and happiness.

When we express an emotion with our face, it is called a facial expression. Smiling is a facial expression.

The middle part of the brain controls facial expressions. Different facial expressions trigger different chemicals in the brain.

Smiling triggers ‘feel-good’ chemicals in our brain and it makes us feel happy. It is easy to smile, so do it as often as possible. In fact, it takes twice as many muscles to frown as it does to smile. There doesn’t even need to be a reason to smile. Try it!

Your teacher forgot to give you homework.

Cross-country running has been cancelled.

You have fantastic, clean teeth!

Your Dad's singing in the shower.

The vending machine dropped two bars of chocolate instead of one.

You have the television remote control.

For your school photograph!

It is perfectly okay to be in a bad mood once in a while. We all get out of bed the wrong side sometimes. But try not to be unhappy for too long.

Why don’t you try to smile? If you smile, your brain will think ‘I’m happy!’ and your mood will improve.

If you can cheer yourself up, just think how good you will be at cheering other people up. What a great friend you will be!

Have you ever smiled when really you didn't think something was funny or didn't like what someone was saying to you? Then you have performed a fake smile.

Researchers have identified about eighteen different smiles. Fake smiles use different muscles to natural smiles and are controlled by different parts of the brain.

Scientists can tell the difference between the two types of smiles using a coding system called the Facial Action Coding System. The tip to spot a fake smile is to look at the person's eyes and see if the eyes are 'smiling' too. If they are, then it is a natural smile.

Did you know that our faces were made to smile? That’s right. We didn’t learn to smile. We were born with the ability to smile.

Babies as young as two days old can smile. They don't learn from other people how to smile. We know this because babies who are born blind smile. They have never seen a smile but they still know how to do it.

Our faces were built to smile!

Smiling is usually the first stage to laughter. If you want to know what makes laughing really good for your health, why don't you read Bizzikid's ALL ABOUT LAUGHING Guide?