Quick answer
The fear of the LORD is not the introduction to wisdom's curriculum. It is the curriculum. And the road to honor runs through the low place, in that order, every time.
Read both lines
The first line names the chapter's closing claim with the book's own motto vocabulary. The fear of the LORD, taught since 1:7 as orientation rather than terror, is here called the instruction of wisdom, the same formation word this chapter has used at verses 5, 10, and 32. What that means is that reverence is not the entrance requirement you satisfy before the training begins; it is the training. A person is being taught wisdom by living oriented toward God, day after day, in ordinary things.
The second line sets the order and refuses to let it be reversed. Humility comes first, honor after, and Proverbs states the same sequence at 18:12 with the warning attached, that before destruction the heart is haughty. Placed at the end of a chapter full of ears and rebukes and correction, the line lands as a summary: every verse about listening has been a verse about the low place, because a person who can be corrected has already accepted the position this line describes.
From this side of the cross
The order held all the way to the cross and back. The pattern of the gospel is descent before exaltation, and grace is still handed out at the bottom rather than the top, which is why the New Testament keeps quoting this book's insistence that God gives grace to the humble.
Related: Proverbs 1:7 · Proverbs 18:12 · Proverbs 22:4 · Proverbs 3:34
New King James Version®, Copyright © 1982, Thomas Nelson. All rights reserved. Full copyright information. Scripture provided by API.Bible.
Go Deeper
If this verse has been used to put weight on you that it was never carrying, ask about it directly.