College and career readiness has become a top priority for elementary schools. Skills-focused approaches often are the sole method of preparing students for their postsecondary futures, which can overshadow the identities that students bring to the classroom. In contrast, the authors adopted an identity-centered approach to literacy instruction using students' career dreams as a focal point by implementing a standards-aligned career exploration unit for students in grades 3-6. The authors share the six multimodal instructional principles that they generated to support upper elementary students' literacy skill development while focusing on their career aspirations and identities.