History Main / YoungerMentorOlderDisciple

* In a {{downplayed}} example, ''Literature/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix'' has Harry become the leader of Dumbledore's Army, a DADA group dedicated to learning the self-defense skills that [[TyrantTakesTheHelm Dolores Umbridge]] refuses to teach. His "students" include schoolmates a grade or two higher (he's a fifth-year, while some like Fred and George Weasley are seventh-years).

* ''Franchise/StarWars'': Count Dooku, who was in his eighties, was this to Palpatine, who was in his sixties at the time. However, Palpatine sought to avert this after Dooku has outlived his usefulness and sought a far younger apprentice in Anakin, and he himself would soon look far older than Dooku after his fight with Mace Windu.

* ''LightNovel/{{Overlord|2012}}'': Ainz is technically in his twenties, but his body is now that of an immortal lich. He ends up teaching magic to TheArchmage Fluder, who's over two hundred years old (or rather, since Ainz was just dropped into his MMO character and has no idea why he has magic or how it works, he gives Fluder some books he found in the guild treasury that talk about magic).

* ''WesternAnimation/KampKoral'': [=SpongeBob=]. In "[[Recap/KampKoralS01E15HillFuSunsOutFunsOut Hill-Fu]]", Nobby — who is smaller than [=SpongeBob=] and barely able to form full sentences, mostly speaking in childlike babbling — trains [=SpongeBob=] in Hill-Fu. He's shown to be pretty good at it, as [=SpongeBob=] is able to stand a chance against the incredibly badass Sandy using what Nobby teaches him.

* Downplayed in ''Webcomic/HowToBeAWerewolf'': Elias is a 22-year-old born as a werewolf among werewolves, who serves as an aide and personal agent to his mother the alpha of a fairly important pack. Malaya is a 25-year-old quasi shut-in who was bitten by a mysterious beast as a five year old girl and whose parents managed to teach her self-containment despite having to work things out as they went along. He caught her scent while she was behind the counter at her father's coffee shop, determined she was not involved in the murders he was investigating, figured out how clueless she was, and [[NiceGuy offered to help]].

* In Literature/TheBible, 12-year-old {{Jesus}} teaches Jewish law to adults at the Temple. Though this was only true of His human body, given that being the Son of God meant that He had existed since eternity past.

* In Literature/TheBible, 12-year-old Jesus teaches Jewish law to adults at the Temple.

* In the Website/QuestDen story ''Shards'', the latest generation of students gets to learn RunicMagic from a foreign teacher thanks to a diplomatic deal. One such student, protagonist Chi Sava, becomes a teacher of runic magic herself, and is hired to teach it to the royal scientists, all of them her seniors by decades.

* ''WesternAnimation/KampKoral'': [=SpongeBob=]. In "[[Recap/KampKoralS01E15HillFuSunsOutFunsOut Hill-Fu]]", Nobby — who is smaller than SpongeBob and barely able to form full sentences, mostly speaking in childlike babbling — trains [=SpongeBob=] in Hill-Fu. He's shown to be pretty good at it, as [=SpongeBob=] is able to stand a chance against the incredibly badass Sandy using what Nobby teaches him.

* ''LightNovel/Overlord2012'': Ainz is technically in his twenties, but his body is now that of an immortal lich. He ends up teaching magic to TheArchmage Fluder, who's over two hundred years old (or rather, since Ainz was just dropped into his MMO character and has no idea why he has magic or how it works, he gives Fluder some books he found in the guild treasury that talk about magic).

[[folder:FanWorks]]
* In the epilogue of the ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' fanfiction, "Anarchy for All," thirty-something Selina Kyle asks twelve year-old Damian to teach her how to sword fight as a way to bond with him [[spoiler:now that she's engaged to his father]]. He gets more into it than expected, channeling a DrillSergeantNasty and ordering her to call him "Master." Either Damian is a great teacher or Selina is a prodigy, because two volumes later, [[spoiler:she can keep up in a duel with Damian's EvilAunt Nyssa, albeit still needing dirty tricks to actually beat her]].

* In ''Fanfic/LaterTraitor'', Frazie Aquato ends up getting tutoring in learning how to use her psychic powers from the other campers at Whispering Rock such as Lili and Phoebe, this despite the others being around the same age as Frazie's younger brother Raz.

* In ''Franchise/StarWars'' Count Dooku, who was in his eighties, was this to Palpatine, who was in his sixties at the time. However, Palpatine sought to avert this after Dooku has outlived his usefulness and sought a far younger apprentice in Anakin, and he himself would soon look far older than Dooku after his fight with Mace Windu.
* ''Film/JacobsLadder'': Jacob's deceased toddler son Gabe guides him to Heaven, now infinitely wiser from his time in the Afterlife.

* ''Literature/TheWheelOfTime'': Nynaeve joins the Aes Sedai MagicalSociety at age 25 to learn {{Healing|Hands}} powers, but soon realizes that one of her AchievementsInIgnorance as an untrained Channeler was to improvise a Healing variant that's far superior to the Aes Sedai method. A few Aes Sedai -- some of them [[WizardsLiveLonger a century or two old]] -- swallow their pride and come to her for guidance.
* In ''Franchise/StarWarsLegends'', in the early days of the New Jedi Order Luke Skywalker had some students who were significantly older than he was, sometimes by decades as in the case of Streen, but had slipped under the Old Jedi Order's radar and were just as inexperienced as the younger students as a result.
* At the end of the {{Novelization}} of ''Literature/RevengeOfTheSith'', Yoda (who is nearly 900) becomes the apprentice of the Force Ghost of Qui-Gon Jinn, who was in his sixties when he was killed. Then again, Qui-Gon has joined his consciousness with the Force, so his age is no longer really a factor.

* "L'Alchimista" by Creator/NKJemisin: The elderly MysteriousStranger who visits SupremeChef Franca's kitchen eventually asks to become her apprentice, even though he's not personally interested in the culinary trade. [[spoiler:He's [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld so long-lived]] that the rules of {{Alchemy|IsMagic}} have changed underneath him, and he needs her fresh, new perspective to keep the Art alive.]]
* In ''Literature/CookingWithWildGame'', inhabitants of the frontier village of Forest's Edge have only recently gained enough spare time and money that they can learn non-essential arts like cooking. (And [[ProudWarriorRace their culture]]'s anti-luxuries stance didn't help.) The guy they get in to teach them is little more than a teenager, but his experience in an urban restaurant and access to foreign ingredients means he knows a lot more than even the grannies and middle-aged women among his students. Unfortunately, the former often try to set him up with their eligible daughters.

* Season 2 of ''Series/TheMandalorian'' ends with Luke Skywalker taking Grogu (aka "Baby Yoda") to be trained as a Jedi, which is further shown in Chapter 6 of ''Series/TheBookOfBobaFett''. At this point, Luke is 30 at the most, while Grogu is over 50 and still an infant by his species' standards.

* Downplayed in ''Webcomic/HowToBeAWerewolf'': Elias is a 22 years old born as a werewolf among werewolves, who serves as an aide and personal agent to his mother the alpha of a fairly important pack. Malaya is a 25 year old quasi shut-in who was bitten by a mysterious beast as a five year old girl and whose parents managed to teach her self-containment despite having to work things out as they went along. He caught her scent while she was behind the counter at her father's coffee shop, determined she was not involved in the murders he was investigating, figured out how clueless she was, and [[NiceGuy offered to help]].

* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': [[TeamMom Katara]], [[HandicappedBadass Toph]], and [[HeelFaceTurn Zuko]] all serve as Aang's mentors to learn all four elements. And while Aang is physically and mentally twelve, he was [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld frozen in ice for 100 years]], making him older than all of them. Even if you don't take his actual age into account, Aang is still slightly older than Toph.
* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', Jinora, Avatar Aang's [[SpinOffspring grandaughter]], is Korra's Spirit Guide. While it isn't a huge age difference, Korra is in her late teens, and Jinora is pre-pubescent.
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': Following the episode titled "Marks For Effort", Applebloom, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Belle become tutors for Twilight's School of Friendship. Keep in mind that they are still fillies and the school has students of various ages. This means that the Cutie Mark Crusader are not only the youngest of the school staff, but they are also younger than some of the students attending the school.

* This is set up at the end of ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'''s first season. [[TheArchmage Eda Clawthorne]]'s mind and [[MageSpecies human(oid)]] form have been restored (for now) but she finds that the vast bulk of her innate magic has been stripped from her. Her de-facto ward Luz Noceda, a [[TrappedInAnotherWorld human teenager]] over three decades her junior who has been discovering [[GeometricMagic glyphs]] that tap the BackgroundMagicField in order to get around her own limitations, promptly offers to teach Eda what she has figured out.
-->"And what we don't know, we can work out together."
** The 'B Plot' of the second season episode 'Escaping Expulsion' [[PlayedForLaughs plays this for comedy]], [[spoiler:with Eda's ''older'' and similarly disempowered sister Lilith going full-on TeachersPet while Eda reverts to the sort of ClassClown that carves [[StuffBlowingUp experimental glyph combinations into her desk]] (yes, there are desks) with a knife rather than focus on "boring" lectures]].

* Leonie Martin of Lisieux, France (known as Sister Fracoise-Therese in her convent) was a disciple of her younger sister, St. Therese.
* Will often be the case for people who transition into different jobs/careers when they’re older. Imagine getting a job/career in your early to mid 20s, working said job/career for 10 years or more and then deciding you’d rather do something else. If you’re starting a new career in an entry-level role, your bosses are more than likely going to be fairly younger than you.

* In Literature/TheBible, Jesus ends up teaching Jewish law while still a child.

* This is set up at the end of ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'''s first season. [[TheArchmage Eda Clawthorne]]'s mind and [[WitchSpecies human(oid)]] form have been restored (for now) but she finds that the vast bulk of her innate magic has been stripped from her. Her de-facto ward Luz Noceda, a [[TrappedInAnotherWorld human teenager]] over three decades her junior who has been discovering [[GeometricMagic glyphs]] that tap the BackgroundMagicField in order to get around her own limitations, promptly offers to teach Eda what she has figured out.

* In ''Fanfic/LaterTraitor'', Lili acts as Frazie Aquato's tutor in learning how to use her psychic powers, this despite the girl being around the same age as Frazie's younger brother Raz.

* In ''Fanfic/LaterTraitor'', Lili acts as Frazie's tutor in learning how to use her psychic powers, this despite the girl being around the same age as her younger brother.

* This is set up at the end of ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'''s first season. [[spoiler:[[TheArchmage Eda]]'s mind and [[WitchSpecies human(oid)]] form have been restored (for now) but she finds that the vast bulk of her innate magic has been stripped from her. Her de-facto ward Luz Noceda, a [[TrappedInAnotherWorld human teenager]] over three decades her junior who has been discovering [[GeometricMagic glyphs]] that tap the BackgroundMagicField in order to get around her own limitations, promptly offers to teach Eda what she has figured out.]]