Across the country, numerous efforts are currently underway to provide struggling adolescent readers with the high-quality interventions, materials, and instruction they need to bring their literacy skills up to grade level expectations. Over the last several years, a strong coalition of educators, researchers, policymakers, professional associations, and advocacy groups has worked to focus the attention of policymakers and the public on the plight of millions of America's students in grades four through twelve who are unable to read and write well enough to achieve even basic academic success. For policymakers, the challenge is no longer just to call attention to the nation's adolescent literacy crisis. Nor is it just to secure new resources to help middle and high school students catch up in reading, although the need for those resources remains critical. The challenge is also to connect the teaching of reading and writing to the rest of the secondary school improvement agenda, treating literacy instruction as a key part of the broader effort to ensure that all students must develop the knowledge and skills they need to succeed in life after high school. This report addresses one important way in which schools can and must improve the literacy instruction they provide to students in grades 4-12. More specifically, it focuses on reading and writing instruction in the academic content areas--particularly the areas of math, science, English, and history--that comprise the heart of the secondary school curriculum. At the same time, this report is meant to extend the discussion begun in a number of recent high-profile publications that have focused national attention on the topic of adolescent literacy, synthesized and expanded the existing knowledge base in this area, and recommended a variety of ways in which educators and policymakers can support better literacy instruction in middle and high schools.