how to get started in open source development

Hello,
I want to participate in gsoc-2014 forwhich I want to know how to
prepare myself so that I can do a project in the event. I am new to
open source, I have read the tutorials in which I found out that to
start on, I can do bugfixes, read source code of projects etc. Can
anyone tell me which are the easiest projects for which I can do
bugfixes and what is a good approach to this. I have an intermediate
knowledge of C, C++. Which new things I should learn apart from C ?

Thank you in advance