Most of us remember these from our childhood.

But how many of us remember what they are called. I asked my facebook followers what names they used for this in English or Spanish.
Here’s what we got:in English, the common names were:
Cootie Catcher
Fortune Teller
Chatterbox

in Spanish:
Boquitas
Adivinador
Matapiojos
Sacapiojos
coco
comecocos
sapito

Ok, great. Now that we have a name (or two) for it, what can we do with it. I found it to be a fun activity to use with my 3rd-5th grade group of students who are learning English. They were able to practice counting, colors, as well as stating “Say a number”, “Choose a color” and then telling the person their “fortune”.

On the first set of flaps, we wrote the names of the colors (or if you have colored pencils, you can certainly color it), and then on the inside flaps we wrote the names of Halloween costumes to tell the person “What are you going to be for Halloween.”

You can also have the students write 8 simple questions in the target language;
“What is your name?”
“Where are you from?”
“What do you like to do?”
and whoever gets that question has to answer the question. Engaging way to get the students talking in a fun way. Or have students write review questions or practice questions for a speaking test.

Here is a step-by-step process of making “un adivinador” in Spanish. Have students read the directions and follow the steps.
Or follow these steps in English.

Too complicated? Download our ready to use Cootie Catcher in Spanish template which comes with 6 ready to use fortune tellers and 1 blank template.

Have you ever used this in your foreign language class? Tell us how in the comments below!