How to predict the future: Make a 'cootie catcher'

Do you have a hunch one of your classmates will be a singing superstar one day? An inkling the boy with curly hair likes you back? A feeling you know exactly what your cat is thinking?

Then you might be a fortuneteller in the making. (And if you answered no — fake it. That's what lots of so-called psychics do.)

With a piece of notebook paper and a pen or some markers, you can create your very own paper fortuneteller. Use it to predict your friends' futures — or your own. Here's how:

How to make a cootie catcher

What you need:

•

1 piece of paper

•

Markers or a pen

1. Turn your paper into a perfect square by folding one corner in diagonally, so it meets the opposite side of the paper. This should create a rectangle at the bottom of the page. Cut or rip it off.

2. Unfold your square. Take each corner and fold it in, so the four corners meet in the middle.

3. Flip the folded paper over and fold the corners into the middle again.

4. It's time to decorate your fortuneteller! Flip it back over and pick four colors to write or draw on the side with four squares.

5. On the other side (the one that looks like it has eight triangles) write down a number on each triangle.

6. On the inside of each number, write a fortune. You can try to predict the future (a mysterious person will visit you in a dream tonight), give an order (do 10 jumping jacks!) or reveal a secret (your crush likes you back!). Then fold everything back down, fold the fortuneteller in half so the colors are on the outside, and open it. There should be four nooks for your fingers.

7. Find a friend in your classroom, on Zoom or at home. Hold the fortuneteller in your hand and show them the colors. Let them pick one, then open it once for each letter in that color (four times for 'blue,' for example). Then have them pick a number and do the same thing. Ask them to pick another number and read them the fortune underneath.