How do I understand math? I know I have asked how to learn math before, and everyone basically told me that I can't memorize and that I have to understand the concepts. Well I didn't think that was possible, and I still don't. Infact from trying to understand concept I am now about 4 weeks behind in class and scheduled to fail the class basically no matter what I do.
Talking to everyone in the class the concensus is that you don't ask questions, you just do it. You memorize as much as you can as fast as you can and then move on to the new material. Don't concern yourself with why things work, this is a waste of time and there just isn't enough time in the class to do this.
I think I agree with this, I mean I try and understand things but I rarely do actually understand it and I usually forget why or how I understand things anyways since there are so many thousands of things to understand, it is easier just to memorize tables, and much quicker.
So I guess I am going to ask, is this wrong? Everyone else does it and they are all passing the class.
If this is wrong, then how the hell do I find the time to actually learn? I just spent 12 hours trying to grind out homework, learned nothing and got some homework done. I feel if I spent that time trying to understand the concepts I likely would have covered even less material.
 A: "Wrong?" Depends. If your goal is just to get a class out of the way, check a box, and collect a diploma, then maybe you can "get by" by just memorizing a list of facts. However, if you do this in some sense you never learned any math.
Mathematics is all about connections between concepts and packaging ideas. 
Trying to make it through math classes by sheer memorization of facts is ok when you're in elementary school learning your addition and multiplication tables. But by the time you hit a second or third semester of calculus this is almost impossible. There are just too many possibilities to keep track of. Not to say you can't pass most elementary calculus courses on memorization and partial credit.
To learn you must "do". But just limping through problems half copying examples out of notes is of limited helpfulness. You might do well to find a tutor who really knows his/her stuff. Work through problems asking "What is my overall strategy?" "How is this like other problems I've solved?" "Why did I need to do steps 1,2,3?" What does each step mean?"
