The findings from this study suggest that 2-year-old children regularly use mark making as a tool to further support their emergent thoughts and understanding of the world. The qualitative study of three 2-year-old children uses observations and informal interviews to construct narrative stories of their explorations and play both at nursery and home. Analysed against schema theory, the findings recognise the important links between 2-year-old children's emerging patterns of cognition, their schema and their mark making. Indicating and illustrating the high cognitive levels, 2-year-old children are capable of achieving resulting from their playful encounters with the world. This article supports Lazzari's call 'for a critical reconceptualization of the relationship existing between research and policymaking.' Only through refreshing the relationship between research and policymaking will we begin to alter the 'limited educational purposes of play and drawing in curriculum policies in England', and truly recognise the capabilities 2-year-old children naturally posses.