daniel
It's a question that could take a long time to answer - the stock market is best treated as a long term investment vehicle, deal in blue chip companies, do not try to pick tops or bottoms, do not listen to tips and do your own research. Education and knowledge is important, and trade with a plan - no plan, no trade.
Warren Buffet - the world's most famous lomg term investor, when asked what is the best time to sell, answers "never"
If you want to become one of the 99.9% of short term traders who fail - try daytrading.
It's extremely tempting to see the current correction as a time to get out - but the market is cyclical and history tells us that long term the trend is up. We have a strong economy with a huge amount of funds that have to be invested through Super funds and the resources sector boom has decades to run (if you believe most "experts") The current market is down 13% from its peak - not terminal.
ps This is not investment advice - you need to be qualified to give that and I'm just a keen observer