Aren't I supposed to get better at this?

It really depends on how you train and use it I think. For me, whenever I get the problem wrong, I pause and go over the moves one by one and try to ask myself why I didn't find the correct variation. For example, what are the things that I should be looking for? What moves were I considering? Are certain pieces trapped, pinned, or unprotected?

If you just go about them without understanding why you're making the mistakes, then you'll probably end up making the same mistakes over and over again, and it may take longer to actually familiarize yourself with the tactical patterns I think.

You've been a member for eleven days and completed 600+ TT problems. My guess is that you're overdoing it.

If you've only been a member for 6 days how much improvement did you expect to make in that time?

Hey Benedictine. Well I thought improvement would tie in to effort.

It takes years to become proficient at this game.

Patience, Grasshopper.

Effort yes, but effort with time with both theory and practice.

If I worked hard at getting a degree in mathematics, really hard, but just spent six days at it, how close would I come to getting my degree? You have to be realisic. Expecting almost any improvement after six days if far from realistic.

@madsmariegaard

You have unrealistic expectations. As an example, say in school, how long did it take you to become somewhat good in mathematics? I guess you learned it for years... 

Keep learning chess for 3 months, then review where you are.

My recommendation is to do less TT puzzles a day. I do 4 new ones every day and review some more I did the previous days. Not more than 10 all in all every day.

Ok, thank you very much for the responses and helpful advice. I'll take it to heart. I guess I didn't realise just how daunting a task it is to get good at chess. I'm borrowing "My System" By Aron Nimzowitsch from the library btw. Hope to get a more realistic outlook from reading that.

Sometimes you learn the most by failing the test. I was feeling frustrated with some of the options under the 'Learn' tab, but when I played games, I suddenly found myself seeing moves I wouldn't have seen before. 

My win rate didn't jump, and my rating is more-or-less the same, but my play has improved and I know I have won games I might have otherwise lost, and gotten out of holes I may have otherwise languished in.

Graphs can be neat, but only use tools that are helpful for you. If the graph is a distraction—or a hinderance!—ignore it or even avoid it. The Chess Mentor is very, very good and doesn't focus on the high school grading approach.

Yes, it's a HUGE task. I've played for 4 years and look where I am. Nowhere.

It's just a very, very long process that's all, chess is not easy and you never beat it.

My system is a little hard, if you're getting it from the library there's no loss and you might get a few things from it but it's not an easy book, probably best for rating 1700+ or roundabouts, certainly not really good for beginners.

Also I agree with setting the tactics trainer to unrated, at least after a while playing with the rating on to find your level. Set the rating below your rating, a couple of hundred points. This will help you cement basic patterns.

Also have a look at Dan Heisman's chess nooks:

http://danheisman.home.comcast.net/~danheisman/Main_Chess/chess.htm

They are on there somewhere.

It's just a very, very long process that's all, chess is not easy and you never beat it.

My system is a little hard, if you're getting it from the library there's no loss and you might get a few things from it but it's not an easy book, probably best for rating 1700+ or roundabouts, certainly not really good for beginners.

Also I agree with setting the tactics trainer to unrated, at least after a while playing with the rating on to find your level. Set the rating below your rating, a couple of hundred points. This will help you cement basic patterns.

Also have a look at Dan Heisman's chess nooks:

http://danheisman.home.comcast.net/~danheisman/Main_Chess/chess.htm

They are on there somewhere.

Alright thank you very much for the feedback. I had no idea you could remove the rating, would have done so in a heartbeat. I realised some time yesterday that it was distracting me. But, I figured everybody had to deal with that. I'll get to playing with the settings and looking into the Dan Heisman books asap.

One thing is, if you go on a playing/learning binge, I've found that it takes awhile for the improvements to gel.  You may indeed have set things up so that you will improve, and by walking away for a week, a month or more at times, I've found that my came has been much better when I came back.  I suspect that in the time off connections were still being made in my brain, from the last deep dive.

No learning disability at all, but maybe your method is not best at the moment.

I suggest going through a book that shows basic tactics grouped by theme first (like Bain's tactics for students, or Seïrawan's Winning chess tactics). It will help your brain structure the information and better deal with failed puzzles, as you'll be able to classify them better.

Then you may want to use Benedictine's method to go through easy problems in unrated mode.

FWIW, I think you have to be a Premmie to turn ratings off. But any old piece-pusher can ignore them. 

You can get better as you practise. Identify where your weakest ability is and train to improve. There are many training aids on this website.

Tactics Trainer is very beneficial. It's probably best used when you're in the mood .. I often do too much of it when I'm a bit tired or jaded, as my TT stats indicate. Keep at it, because I think it's very good for board vision too; after a few months I stopped hanging pieces and began to see things a lot better.