The forearm is the part of your arm between your elbow and your wrist. When you rest your elbows on a table and hold a book up to read, your forearms are doing most of the work. This section of your arm contains two long bones and many muscles that control your hand and fingers.

If you turn your hand palm-up and then palm-down, you can feel your forearm muscles working to twist your wrist. These muscles also help you grip things, from a pencil to a baseball bat. Rock climbers develop especially strong forearms because they constantly grip handholds. You can see the muscles and tendons in your forearm by making a fist and watching how they move under your skin.

The word can also be part of the phrase “to be forearmed”, which means to be prepared in advance for something challenging. When you are forearmed with knowledge before a test, you're getting ready ahead of time, like a warrior putting on armor before battle.