Exploring new openings

I'm currently a member of my school's chess team. And for the past 3 years I've been on this team, but this is my last year and I would like to take the chance to learn a few new openings. I mostly stick with a pretty basic defense and a standard king's pawn double push to start. I doing this I limit my options for reacting to several different situations, and to add to it I'm terrible with unexpected moves, I would like to have some help, some advice on best ways to open the game, and to react to the other player's moves better.

Any advice that can be offered would be greatly appreciated, and I hope that this topic can help other players like me.

Thanks again everyone,

TheRouge18

Some more information about the openings that you actually play would be really helpful in answering, bearing in mind that you as a player can't always dictate the opening played.

You'll want an opening for white (duh right?)

Be prepared as black to face e4 and d4, and also c4 and Nf3.  Those are the big 4 that you should have a prepared response to. (You can find some openings that you can play against more then one of these, which can cut down on your study time)

Since you are in the experimental phase of selecting openings you should ask yourself questions like...

1) Would I prefer to play  more positional (closed/semi-closed) or tactical (open) games?

2)  Do I want to play a symetrical, or non-symetrical opening?

Then select some choices and play some blitz games to get a feel for them, see if you like the flavor of the games they produce or not.  Don't bother learning too much beyond the first few moves just yet.  

   After experimenting in this way you may find some openings that you like.  Marry them.  Be prepared to commit to those openings for a while (like a year or more) and then play them, study them, go over your games after they are over to see where you deviated from the book response, or how you could've improved.  After a while, you'll start to become comfortable with your openings of choice.

Just remember to not neglect other aspects of your chess study. (tactics, strategy, and endgame)  Good luck!

thanks for the advice