Pediatric physical therapy aims to improve children’s mobility, strength, balance, flexibility, and coordination, addressing various diagnoses, conditions, or developmental differences. Since each child presents unique needs, abilities, and goals, designing tailored exercise programs becomes paramount. Although universal exercises do not exist, recognizable categories emerge, accommodating diverse pediatric physical therapy requirements. Below lies an overview of common exercise types linked to specific pediatric physical therapy scenarios:

Exercise type 1: Strength training:

Ideal for building muscular power, endurance, and hypertrophy, strength training consists of resistance-based activities performed against gravity, elastic bands, weight machines, free weights, bodyweight, medicine balls, or partner-assisted maneuvers. Examples include squats, lunges, pushups, pull-ups, step-ups, deadlifts, rows, curls, extensions, presses, rotations, and flexions. Customized strength training programs address myriad pediatric physical therapy cases, such as cerebral palsy, spinal cord injuries, muscular dystrophies, genetic syndromes, orthopedic issues, obesity, and sedentary lifestyles.

Exercise type 2: Balance & proprioception:

Balance and proprioceptive exercises improve stability, equilibrium, kinesthetic awareness, and spatial orientation by challenging vestibular, somatosensory, and visual inputs. Common examples include single-limb stands, tandem walks, and heel-toe marches, wobble boards, rocker boards, foam rollers, dyna discs, BOSU balls, TRX suspension trainers, yoga poses, Pilate’s reformers, and Tai Chi flows. Such activities prove beneficial for children with neurological impairments, concussions, postural dysfunctions, gait abnormalities, and sports-related injuries.

Exercise type 3: Cardiovascular conditioning:

Cardiovascular conditioning improves aerobic capacity, respiratory efficiency, circulatory circulation, and metabolic regulation via steady-state or interval-style workouts. Popular options range from walking, jogging, running, cycling, swimming, rowing, stairclimbing, boxing, kickboxing, dancing, skating, skiing, snowboarding, surfing, paddleboarding, to playing organized sports like soccer, basketball, baseball, softball, tennis, golf, hockey, lacrosse, rugby, or football. Children presenting with asthma, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, obesity, ADHD, depression, or anxiety may significantly profit from cardiovascular conditioning programs.

Exercise type 4: Stretching & flexibility:

Stretching and flexibility exercises aim to increase passive, static, active, or ballistic range of motion surrounding major joints, thereby mitigating stiffness, tightness, tension, discomfort, or pain. Methods encompass static stretching, dynamic stretching, PNF stretching, AIS stretching, yoga, Pilates, tai chi, qigong, and Feldenkrais. Targeted applications extend to juvenile idiopathic arthritis, Down syndrome, Marfan syndrome, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, Beals syndrome, fibromyalgia, hypermobility spectrum disorders, and habitual postural malalignments.