Here's some advice on reading mathematics by Harry Markowitz. If you don't know who he is, look here. If you're in EC4024 and you don't know who he is, be afraid.
From his 1959 Efficient Portfolio Selection (fulltext here), pages 37-38.
Mathematics and You
The relationships between securities and portfolios, to be discussed, are mathematical in nature. They follow from definitions of terms and properties of numbers. Like the theorems of geometry, they are subject to precise statement and rigorous definition.
Except for the appendices, this monograph was written to meet the needs of the reader without mathematical training. The writer has attempted to illustrate concepts concretely, to avoid excessively mathematical apparatus in easy stages. Successive chapters build on previously presented concepts, relationships, and apparatus, thus allowing the reader to raise his level of mathematical sophistication gradually.
The non-mathematician cannot expect to skim this monograph as if it were a novel, or skip around in it as if it were a newspaper. The subject progresses step by step. The journey can be completed only if each step is taken in turn. Here are four rules which should aid the reader:
1. Avoid "good" reading habits. Some modern reading methods encourage the reader to grasp phrases in a glance, move steadily forward, never reread a passage, never mull over a detail. Although such practices may be excellent for quickly reading a novel, they are not suited to to comprehension of unfamiliar mathematical material! Rapid reading becomes increasingly out of the question as we introduce more compact notation. A few symbols can represent dozens of words of ordinary English. To attempt to swallow such a concentrated morsel in a single gulp is bound to lead to intellectual indigestion.
2. Pay particular attention to definitions. It is impossible for the reader to understand the significance of a theorem or follow a proof if he does not know the exact meaning of terms. Terms of special significance are in italic type when first introduced.
3. Pay particular attention to theorems. A theorem is a compact, formal statement of an important relationship between concepts. Most of our discussions are directly or indirectly related to some theorem. They explain theorems, prove theorems, illustrate the importance of theorems. If the theorems are understood, their applications to problems of portfolio selection follow as corollaries.
4. Take time to understand proofs. A proof shows that the relationships expressed in a theorem follow from definitions of terms and properties of numbers. A theorem learned by rote will soon loose meaning and slip from memory. Once the reasons for the validity of the theorem are seen, once its proof is understood, once the inevitability and logical necessity of the relationship are comprehended, the theorem becomes like an old friend not easily forgotten, quick to be recognized if met again.