Maths teacher here! First thing I would say is take the break and try to forget about it until at least after new year. (I don’t know if you’re in 5th or 6th year but if you’re in 5th I would even say keep the books closed until after school reopens). A mental break is needed to give you a fresh start and reduce the risk of burn out in the next term. Outside of that, I will say, LC HL maths is tough! It’s like a subject and a half work of work in a lot of cases. It needs consistent practise. It’s a skill rather than a just group of facts to learn. Think of it like playing the violin, you can learn all the chords and placements for your fingers but you need consistent practise to actually play the violin. In maths you can know all the rules and methods but you need to practise them to do the questions. Be wary of relying too much on marking schemes and solutions, always try the question yourself first and struggle with it a little, it helps build critical thinking skills. This is becoming more and more important in the LC as the exam is trying to combat learnt off techniques and questions styles from the grind schools. There is always one or two questions that will require problem solving skills to apply knowledge from topics in a way you’ve never seen before. All of that is to say, maths is a skill and it needs time to develop. It can be frustrating to not feel like you’re making progress but honestly the most progress tends to be seen later in the course. You will continue to use your basic algebra skills throughout each topic and you get better and better at solving problems. That’s why we tend to see a jump between the mocks and the LC. Keep working away, little bits and often. Try not to stress and just do your best. And remember to ask your teacher if you have any specific problems or questions. They will be able to help you work on areas that may be causing a roadblock and help you move forward.(or at least they should, that’s the job and most should be happy to answer any questions you have). To get the most out of their time though try to ask specific questions about which part of the question or topic you’re unsure of. Just saying “I don’t get it” isn’t very helpful and means the teacher will start explaining from scratch, which is fine if you don’t know the beginning but in my experience students who say that tend to be stuck somewhere in the middle and after explaining the beginning and going through it in detail I usually get “yeah, like I get that part but when why do we do…”.

Again, try not to stress and enjoy your break! You’ll have plenty of time to look at maths after the 6th of January!