English · Idiom Candidate

crawl before one walks

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Both English Tiếng Việt

Meaning · English

Learn basic skills before attempting more complex ones

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

học kỹ năng cơ bản trước khi thử thách phức tạp

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: move on hands and knees before taking steps

Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

She wants to start a business, but I told her to crawl before she walks

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-30; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “crawl before one walks” mean?

Learn basic skills before attempting more complex ones Literally: move on hands and knees before taking steps

Is “crawl before one walks” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.

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