My daughter has been the Queen of Negotiation since she left the unterus. Everyone says she should be a lawyer, so it's not that bad (unless u live with it, right?). What I found very effective was that I would give her choices from the get go. When I woke her up in the morning, I would say, "Do u want one minute or 5?" When I was givng out cookies for dessert, I would say, do you want 2 or 3?" Obviously I was planning on givng 3, but if I did that, she would always ask for more (whatever it was). She always wanted to one up the ante (and still does). Now she is 13, and I see, her general behavior is very good when I see how other kids act with their parents. Don't worry, we still have our moments like any mom/daughter, but this way really limited whining and arguments. Another trick I learned from a grandma, was to constantly reinforce what the limits are beforehand, and then remind them during, then after if necessary. For example, when we went to the playground, I would tell her before we left the house, "We are staying until 3:00" and show her what 3:00 looks like on the phone (I don't wear a watch), then before we walked into the playground, I would get down to her eyelevel, and make sure she was looking at me, and say, remember, we leave at 3:00. When I say it's time to leave, you have to leave. You are not allowed to ask for more time, cry, scream, tell me you want to finish a game, we leave at 3. Do u understand? If you do that, we can't go to the park, OK? What time are we leaving? What are we going to do at 3:00?" etc. It really made things a lot smoother. As they get older, i vary this theme. I always ask her to repeat it, I did it with her friends too when they came over. Also, with good manners, when I would bring her and her friends in after playing in the snow, I would say as we stood in front of the door, "What do we do before we go in? Wipe our....." and they would enthusiastically yell "Feet!". Kids love to be right and when you tell them "Very good, you are so smart!", they do a good job too. One more thing, sorry this is so long, but timing her worked too, when I would say let's see how long it will take you put all the stuffed animals back in the basket, on your mark, get set....not yet....GO", and the anicipation for the GO, she would get and place and cudn't wait to go. And I would count. Then the next time, I would say, let's see if you can do it faster than before. Good luck!