This paper presents the six levels of meaning in reading and discusses them in relation to the subskills which the English-as-a-second-language (ESL) reader must acquire in order to fully understand the author's message. The contents include: "Meaning," which presents the six levels of meaning--knowing, comprehending, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating; "Knowing," which discusses knowing word structure, recognizing sentence structure, knowing word function, knowing the function of punctuation, knowing denotative meaning, and recalling specific information; "Comprehending," which looks at understanding of the message and restating the message; "Applying," which discusses forming generalizations, making inferences, and drawing conclusions; "Analyzing," which discusses indentifying sequences, identifying main ideas, detecting connotative meaning, identifying figurative language, and discovering relationships; "Synthesizing," which looks at creating new ideas; and "Evaluating," which discusses self-appraising of biases, judging information as valid or invalid, evaluating information as fact or opinion, assessing propaganda, and evaluating the quality of the written word. (WR)