Jobs in the Real World 101 & Software Engineers

What language and what will i be performing if i go into the computer programming field? I am heading to college next year and I want to get some practice before then.I have been going to monster.com and typing in software engineers. I want to practice doing real world programming and seeing how it is. Can someone give me some tips on what languages most companies want employees to know and what jobs they will performing. What languages do you recommend me learning for the real world in the job field? What will I be doing in the job field?