Children when they are little make parents fools, when they are great they make them mad. 
Proverbs on a similar topic
- Never too late to learn.
- Practice makes perfect.
- Experience is the best teacher.
- Spare the rod and spoil the child.
- Teach your grandmother to suck eggs.
- Better to ask the way than go astray.
- Many things are lost for want of asking.
- Mistakes are often the best teachers.
- Never offer to teach fish to swim.
- No man is born Wise or learned.
- They must hunger in frost that will not work in heat.
- What youth is used to, age remembers.
- The young pig grunts like the old sow.
- Better children weep than old men.
- One father can support ten children; ten children cannot support one father.
- The man who has not been flogged is not educated.
Related proverbs
Similar proverbs in another language
French
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Petits enfants, petits tourments; grands enfants, grands tourments.
Little children, little torments; big children, big torments.
German
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Kleine Kinder — kleine Sorgen; große Kinder — große Sorgen.
Small children - small worries; big children - big worries.
Czech
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Malé děti, malá starost, velké děti, velká starost.
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Malé děti kaši jedí, a velké děti srdce užírají.
Little kids eat porridge, and big kids eat their hearts out.
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Malé děti jedí chléb, velké pijí krev.
Little children eat bread, big children drink blood.