Dynamic arm stretches involve gentle bouncing or swinging movements meant to force your elbow, shoulder or wrist joints past their normal ranges of motion, according to The Stretching Institute.

Just as you monitor your child's academic progress and social development, you also need to keep an eye on her fitness level. Along with strength and endurance, flexibility is a key component of fitness.

The muscles that run along the sides of your waist, the obliques, allow you to bend sideways and rotate your trunk. When these muscles are tight, it can inhibit your performance in sports requiring overhead hitting as well as cause a misalignment of the spine to the right or left.

If you’re suffering from upper back and neck pain, the chances are that the pain has been caused by tight muscles. Sitting too long in one spot -- or sitting or standing hunched forward -- even some forms of exercise, can cause your muscles to ache.

When you've pushed your body harder, exercised longer or performed some type of new resistance training, you'll probably feel at least a bit of soreness in the following days. You may be tempted to stretch those muscles to ease some of that pain, but that could be a waste of time.

Your gluteus minimus muscles can become strained through overuse, often due to muscle imbalances in the legs and hips. Stretching the gluteus minimus lengthens the muscles to release tension so that the muscles can resume their proper length.

Due to sedentary lifestyles, many people experience pain and stiffness in their sacral area. It's the region that's located in your lower back, starting at your tailbone and spanning up to where your lumbar begins at the L5 vertebra.

Your psoas is a large muscle that's attached to vertebrae in your low back on one end and the top of your thigh bone on the other. The psoas, also called the hip flexor, is responsible for flexion in your hip and thigh. A tight psoas muscle can cause problems in your low back and hip area.

The SI joint, or sacroilial joint, is located between your sacrum and ilium, which is the middle bone of your pelvis below the sacrum. It functions as a shock absorber and helps stabilize your body during movement. Therefore, the SI joint provides little movement in flexion and extension of your pelvis and lower spine.

Improving flexibility and range of motion can be as important to your overall fitness as strengthening your muscles; flexible muscles are more agile and less prone to injury.

Back pain can be a result of chronic overuse, poor posture or an acute injury. If the pain is a result of acute or sudden injury, a medical professional should be sought before attempting to rehab your injury.

The back of your lower leg is a complex muscle group that requires regular stretching exercises, especially if you participate in a sport that requires a lot of running.