I need to make sure that I understand how to connect speakers in parallel. To do that, do you need to go from one speaker's negative, to the other speaker's positive, and then just connect the other positive and negatives to the amplifier? Is that how it's done?
No that would be a series connection. To hook them up in parallel, connect both speakers black to the amp, and both speakers red to the amp.
First: Be sure that your amp can handle the power demand. Underpowering speakers is the most common way they are damaged. You can connect both pairs of speakers directly to the amp just following regular positive/negative inputs -or- you can connect the second speaker on each side to the first in the chain. Just insert the leads from the second speaker into the first speaker. Electrically this is the same setup. Parallel. The setup you described in your question is indeed series.
