Can you make a Chatterbox to help spread positivity, kindness and friendship to those you know and meet? This activity is a great way to tell others why they are important to you, build confidence, express our feelings and have a lot of fun with our friends, family and groups! Follow the steps below to make your chatterbox and then play with people you know to share messages or actions of encouragement, kindness and friendship or educate someone on a topic.
An origami paper chatterbox is also sometimes known as a fortune teller. Some say that it resembles a talking puppet. Your participant will find their ‘fortune’ at the end of the game and you can make your chatterbox ‘speak’ like a talking puppet with your hands!
Making your Chatterbox
Firstly, grab a piece of paper. The paper needs to be a square so if you don’t have square paper you can follow the trick below to make your A4 paper into an equal square
Open out your square and fold diagonally in half to create cross fold lines. Try to push down hard to make your folds as defined as possible as this will help in the end
Now you have your cross folds, open out again and fold each corner into the middle point. Once you have folded all four corners you will have a smaller square
Turn your smaller square over and again, fold the corners into the centre point. Again, you have created a smaller square
Next, fold your chatterbox in half, then open out and fold in half again to make all your folds defined as possible
You should now be able to place your thumb and index finger and pull open to create your chatterbox as below. Check that you can easily open and close your chatterbox as this will be essential for using it once it’s decorated.
Adding your messages of kindness/adding a theme
Now that you have made your chatterbox you can start to decorate it and add in your messages of positivity, kindness and/or friendship. You could decide that you want to include some actions or suggestions for example letting someone know they could take a walk in a green space to help feel more calm and connected to nature or a challenge such as counting how many trees they see on their daily walk. Be as creative as you like with your messages, questions or actions.
The chatterbox ‘game’ starts with the participant choosing from four options. Usually these four options are the answer to a question, for example your question could be “how do you feel today?” and the participant has four feelings to choose from. You could also have four colours, animals or numbers to choose from. Once you have decided what your four options are draw or write them into your four squares.
Now open out your chatterbox so that you can see eight triangle sections between your folds. Right down numbers 1-8 in each section (if you are feeling more creative and have eight colours, you could choose to do colours here instead of numbers).
Open out your chatterbox again and underneath each number (or colour) write down your message, question or action. Depending on who you are making your chatterbox for you may want to personalise it for one person to spread kindness and friendship to them or you may want to make a more general one to let anyone you meet know how they can be more mindful and more connected to nature.
Finally fold back up your chatterbox of friendship and you’ll be ready try it out with your household, friends and others you meet!
Using your Chatterbox
Hold your chatterbox with your thumbs and index fingers closed at first. Ask your participant your first question. Using the letters of the word they have chose open and close your chatterbox that many times (e.g. for HAPPY open/close 5 times).
Then ask your participant to choose a number, repeat the opening and closing the same amount of times as the number chosen and ask your participant to choose from the numbers again.
Open the flap and read the message, question or action written underneath. Repeat as many times as you like!
Take it Further
Can you make different chatterboxes for different situations? You could create another chatterbox to educate others on issues such as the climate emergency and refugee and migrant issues or to get to know a friend better with different questions.
Share with us the chatterboxes you make! If sharing on social media don’t forget to use #DreamBigAtHome
Mental health awareness week 2021 is taking place in May, this year’s theme is nature. Use your chatterbox to help others find out how spending time in and connecting to nature can positively benefit our mental health and wellbeing!
If you enjoyed making chatterboxes of friendship and would like to give out messages of positivity in other ways check out Spreading Positivity to see how you could give encouraging and friendly messages to others in your area.
