Repetition will come into play in your training program in several different ways as well.

Practice Makes Perfect

Repetition implies practice. Just like getting to Carnegie Hall, your dog needs practice, and lots of it, to become well trained. Particularly when modifying unwanted behaviors, you have to make sure your dog is practicing her replacement behavior (sit instead of jump, for instance) regularly for her to form a new, more acceptable habit. If she doesn't get to practice, the behavior you want won't be there when you need it. Chapters 9 through 16 give suggestions for how many repetitions to do, but five repetitions per session is a reasonable number to aim for.

Generalization

Your dog will need lots of repetition of each exercise in different situations before she truly understands the command. Dogs are very context specific. For example, if you train the sit-stay in your kitchen every day, she'll be very good at the sit-stay… in your kitchen. It is likely that she'll have no idea that the sit-stay she does in the kitchen has anything to do with what you're asking her to do when you're trying to write your check at the vet's office — until you teach her. To help her generalize a command, or understand that sit-stay means sit-stay, wherever you happen to be, you'll have to work on it in different environments until she shows you she understands it by responding reliably. You will find out how to help your dog generalize and become reliable at the end of this chapter.