Assume that your pupil knows that people look with a certain contempt upon causeless giggling, and explain why. Make clear how important it is for people to be able to control their facial muscles, their expression, their laughter; how absolutely necessary it often becomes to be able to forego laughter. Then suggest some simple exercises for the gaining of this control; and above all, show an appreciation of the trouble a lively little girl has to control her risibilities. Give her permission, if necessary, to step out of the room when she feels an uncontrollable desire to giggle; usually being alone helps to control the spasm. If possible, interest this leader, with her wealth of spontaneity and high spirits, in some enterprise in which she may use all her surplus energy. Step out into the hall and ask Lulu solicitously if she has recovered from her fit of giggling; probably she will be ready to step to her seat and go on with her work quietly. If she is not, make her comfortable in the hall, and tell her to wait after school for a little talk. You are not punishing her in doing this; you are trying to cure her of a disease, to help her gain a control which she has not so far accomplished. COMMENTS By treating the meaningless giggling as a disease, for which kind words and a remedy are appropriate, it becomes less desirable in the eyes of the girls; it is like a headache or a cold. With the leader removed and no irritating opposition on the part of the teacher, the giggling will soon die down. This attitude is not a pretense on the teacher’s part. The truth is that spontaneous giggling is sometimes a sign of serious nervous trouble, and suggests the need of a specialist’s care. Oftener, however, it is simply the sign of poor nervous control, and can be overcome by a little wise and kind guidance. An epidemic of giggling becomes as irresistible to a group of little girls, and often to big ones as well, as an epidemic of measles. They do not know how to control it, and if they think it is going to tease the teacher, they probably do not want to. The suggestion of the need of control, the friendly helpfulness in proposing means of gaining this control, and the readiness to allow legitimate laughter when it occurs, all remove the idea of wrongdoing, blame, and antagonism. There is no longer any fun in giggling to annoy the teacher; she is not annoyed, she becomes sympathetic, and the teaser becomes conscious that something is wrong with herself. When the laughing first breaks out, however, and everything seems funny to the pupils for the time being, then is a good time for the teacher to say something funny too and thereby associate herself with the pleasure the children are having. The fact of having indulged them in their merriment for a moment will give her greater power to stop them when the laugh is over.