learn to walk before one can run en · VERB
Pronunciation
- (Australia) audio
Meanings
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(idiomatic) To learn how to perform simple tasks before one can perform a more complicated task.
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.
2007, David A Herzog, Math You Can Really Use-Every Day, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, →ISBN, page 1:Optimal performances can also be used as platforms for achieving greater things in performance later. You might think of optimal performance as learning to walk before you can run or learning the arias before the whole role or running many ten-kilometer races before you try to run a marathon.
1998, Alma Thomas, Power Performance for Singers: Transcending the Barriers, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 29:
- Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see learn, walk, before, run.
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| learned to walk before one could run | Tense=Past, VerbForm=Part | lexicographic | |
| learned to walk before one could run | Tense=Past | lexicographic | |
| learnt to walk before one could run | Tense=Past, VerbForm=Part | lexicographic | |
| learnt to walk before one could run | Tense=Past | lexicographic | |
| know how to walk before one can run | alternative | lexicographic | |
| learns to walk before one can run | Number=Sing, Person=3, Tense=Pres | lexicographic | |
| learning to walk before one can run | Tense=Pres, VerbForm=Part | lexicographic |
Relateds
Translations (4)
fi tyvestä puuhun noustaan (Translations) · yue 唔好未學行，先學走 /唔好未学行 (Translations) · vi chưa học bò đã lo học chạy (Translations) · vi chưa học bò chớ lo học chạy (Translations)