This article is drawn from a study conducted to explore how assessment conversations, a type of informal formative assessment, can support science learning in a technology-aided seventh-grade classroom in Northern California. The classroom setting where the study took place used interactive whiteboards in conjunction with the inquiry-based activities, but what made the learning useful were the conversations in which the teachers and students were all engaged. For this study, the author identified the discussions between the teacher and the English language learner (ELL) students in terms of assessment conversations, using the ESRU cycle (Elicits a question; the Student responds; the teacher Recognizes the student's response; the teacher Uses the response) and then analyzed the language used in the assessment conversations utilizing the Systemic Functional Framework (SFL). This study is rooted in three major bodies of literature: (1) formative assessments for learning; (2) sociocultural theory of learning; and (3) SFL. This article highlights the main concepts from each of these areas and discusses how each area informs the author's study of assessment conversations. By analyzing instances of ESRU cycles and examining the language used by the teacher and students in the ESRU cycle, it has been demonstrated that assessment conversations can be operationalized for ELLs in a middle school science classroom using interactive whiteboards.