When planning to teach science to students who are English language learners (ELLs), science teachers and some science educators look to sheltered instruction as a potential guide. The possibility of blending inquiry-based teaching with a sheltered instruction framework seems a promising method for providing high-quality science learning experiences to students who are still working to attain English fluency. However, through the authors' work with second graders, many of whom were ELLs, they perceived substantial discrepancies between their successes with teaching science by inquiry versus the manner in which sheltered instruction has been represented to them. The authors do not see this conflict as insurmountable; nevertheless, a fresh conceptualization of the interface between inquiry-based science teaching and sheltered instruction seems necessary. This article reports a study which represents a modest effort at addressing the issue. (Contains 5 figures.)