how to connect sql to vb.net

how do i establish a connection to read and display paramaters

You make a connection using an SQLConnection, OracleConnection, or OledbConnection. You have Command Objects for each of these, e.g. sqlCommand. This can be an SQL Query, a stored Proc, or a Table. You can exectute commands on your connection object, such as ExecuteScaler, ExecuteNonQuery, and ExecuteReader. You no longer have Recordsets or Cursors. You have Datasets. You can make a DataReader (similar to a forward only cursor) or a DataAdapter (which can be used to update/delete/insert). You can do all this via code, or you can use the controls that come with .Net, but these controls are very different from the old VB6 controls. The point here is, telling you everything you need to know about Data Access via ADO.Net would fill a book. I'd suggest looking up some of the terms I've outlined here on MSDN.