Hey guys, have been working with Skritter for serveral years now and there is one thing that keeps me confused while working with Skritter.

The synonyms.

let's take the English word "plan" or "to plan" for an example.

Over the years, I added several chinese words with similar meaning and I mix them up a lot.
Examples: 计划 安排 打算 打算

Unfortunately, I have not yet found a website with explanations of the different of use of those words and how to tell them apart.

What are your strategies to deal with this problem?

(just to be clear: this is not the only synonym that puzzles me. I certainly need a general strategy for this issue. translations for the aforementioned chinese words won't do :D )

If you're just adding words from a list, e.g. adding all the words from HSK with no context, I agree it will be difficult to tell some of them apart. It might be better to use Skritter to commit words you have already learned or at least encountered to long term memory.

Otherwise, here are some suggestions:
1. Learn the examples of the words given with Skritter. If there are none provided, you can search the word in Baidu and pick an interesting sentence or two which gives you an idea how to use the word.

2. Look the definition up in an online Chinese dictionary. Even if you have to mouse-over the words you don't know, you can still get a much better feel of the meaning and use than you can from a straight translation.

3. Don't worry! Just learn all three of them as "plan". If you can, also learn what part of speech they are, e.g. verb, or noun and verb. Hopefully after enough exposure, you will start to develop your own intuition of how to use the words. Read/listen as much as you can - this is important for learning any language. If you talk to friends or a tutor in Chinese, have them correct you whenever you make a mistake.

Hope this helps.

I would suggest purchasing a synonym dictionary. It is not a panacea, and you'll still have to look at the context, but I think it could help you clarify general usage differences, especially when those differences are structural/not simply a matter of word choice.