It may seem a little silly, but it helps to review these (link below) every once in a while until they start to be a little more intuitive to you
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Checkmate_pattern
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As for strategy during a game, what you want to look for are all the squares around the enemy king that it can use to escape. So let's use your game as an example. In the position below I'll mark the squares that the black king is free to use.
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In your game you checked the king by moving your pawn. The engine points out this move is fine, but that's not the point. The way you can checkmate more easily in your games is to look at those squares marked in green and imagine how you might influence them. For example if your queen were on g5 that would be checkmate right?
Let's look at another position from the game.
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In the above position black's king has no safe squares, so if you can put it in check at close distance, then it will automatically be checkmate. The green arrow shows how white can checkmate in 2 moves.
Another position below.
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In the above position black's king can escape to h6. Can you see a way to control h6 in one move without moving the queen? This is a little tricky 
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Obviously your opponent will try to stop you, so in most cases the opponent will try to create new safe squares for his king by running away or by moving his own pieces out of the way, but thinking in these terms will help you mate much more quickly when you have a large material advantage.
[Date "01/29/2021 08:44PM"]
[FEN rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1]
[White "JosephHubb1222"]
[Black "Emir"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteElo "750"]
[BlackElo "1000"]
[Termination "JosephHubb1222 wins by Checkmate"]
1.e4 c5 2.c3 Nf6 3.f3 e6 4.e5 d5 5.exf6 e5 6.fxg7 Bxg7 7.d3 Nd7 8.h4 Qe7 9.Bg5 Rf8 10.Bxe7 Kxe7 11.Nd2 d4 12.cxd4 Kf6 13.dxe5+ Kg6 14.h5+ Kf5 15.f4 Nb8 16.Qc2 Kg4 17.Ne2 Bf5 18.Ne4 Bxe4 19.dxe4 c4 20.Qxc4 Bh6 21.g3 Bxf4 22.Rh4+ Kg5 23.Nxf4 Rg8 24.Qxf7 Nd7 25.Qe7+ Kh6 26.Qxd7 Raf8 27.Qxb7 Rf7 28.Qxf7 Rxg3 29.Qxa7 Rg5 30.e6 Re5 31.b4 Ra5 32.bxa5 Kg5 33.Qc5+ Kxh4 34.e7 Kg4 35.e8=Q Kh4 36.e5 Kg4 37.e6 Kxf4 38.e7 h6 39.Qf8+ Kg3 40.e8=Q Kh2 41.Qg6 Kh1 42.Qd4 Kh2 43.Qh4# {1-0}
does anyone know where I would go to learn how to beat opponents without having to take out the whole board? On the rare occasion that I win a game, they always end up looking like this one