"learn to walk before one can run" meaning in English

See learn to walk before one can run in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Audio: En-au-learn to walk before you can run.ogg [Australia] Forms: learns to walk before one can run [present, singular, third-person], learning to walk before one can run [participle, present], learned to walk before one could run [participle, past], learned to walk before one could run [past], learnt to walk before one could run [participle, past], learnt to walk before one could run [past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|learn<,,learned:learnt> to walk before one can<can,can,could> run}} learn to walk before one can run (third-person singular simple present learns to walk before one can run, present participle learning to walk before one can run, simple past and past participle learned to walk before one could run or learnt to walk before one could run)
  1. (idiomatic) Before one can perform a complicated task, one has to learn how to perform more simple tasks. Tags: idiomatic Translations (Translations): 唔好未學行，先學走 (Chinese Cantonese), 唔好未学行 (Chinese Cantonese), tyvestä puuhun noustaan (Finnish)
    Sense id: en-learn_to_walk_before_one_can_run-en-verb-MFBsQa3Z Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 93 7 Disambiguation of 'Translations': 94 6
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see learn, walk, before, run.
    Sense id: en-learn_to_walk_before_one_can_run-en-verb-ZDo7uE2W
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Synonyms: know how to walk before one can run Related terms: look before one leaps

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for learn to walk before one can run meaning in English (3.9kB)

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    {
      "form": "learns to walk before one can run",
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    {
      "form": "learned to walk before one could run",
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    {
      "form": "learned to walk before one could run",
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      "form": "learnt to walk before one could run",
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      "name": "en-verb"
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  "related": [
    {
      "_dis1": "50 50",
      "word": "look before one leaps"
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  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "93 7",
          "kind": "other",
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          "text": "Our mathematics education —particularly our arithmetic education— began with the least important numbers and worked through the years to get us to the more important ones. I guess that follows the theory of having to learn to walk before you can run and defers to the lower capacity of the young child's mind to grasp more complex models.",
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        "Before one can perform a complicated task, one has to learn how to perform more simple tasks."
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      "id": "en-learn_to_walk_before_one_can_run-en-verb-MFBsQa3Z",
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        "(idiomatic) Before one can perform a complicated task, one has to learn how to perform more simple tasks."
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          "_dis1": "94 6",
          "code": "yue",
          "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "唔好未學行，先學走"
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          "code": "yue",
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          "word": "唔好未学行"
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          "_dis1": "94 6",
          "code": "yue",
          "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
          "note": "先学走 (m⁴ hou² mei⁶ hok⁶ haang⁴, sin¹ hok⁶ zau², literally “don't learn to run before one can walk”)",
          "sense": "Translations"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "94 6",
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "tyvestä puuhun noustaan"
        }
      ]
    },
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      "glosses": [
        "Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see learn, walk, before, run."
      ],
      "id": "en-learn_to_walk_before_one_can_run-en-verb-ZDo7uE2W",
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          "walk",
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          "run",
          "run#English"
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      "word": "know how to walk before one can run"
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  "word": "learn to walk before one can run"
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    {
      "form": "learned to walk before one could run",
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      "form": "learnt to walk before one could run",
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          "ref": "2007, David A Herzog, Math You Can Really Use-Every Day, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, page 1",
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        "(idiomatic) Before one can perform a complicated task, one has to learn how to perform more simple tasks."
      ],
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    {
      "word": "know how to walk before one can run"
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  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "yue",
      "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "唔好未學行，先學走"
    },
    {
      "code": "yue",
      "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "唔好未学行"
    },
    {
      "code": "yue",
      "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
      "note": "先学走 (m⁴ hou² mei⁶ hok⁶ haang⁴, sin¹ hok⁶ zau², literally “don't learn to run before one can walk”)",
      "sense": "Translations"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
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      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "tyvestä puuhun noustaan"
    }
  ],
  "word": "learn to walk before one can run"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.