four-letter rebus contrivaganza

i wanted a rebus puzzle without differing font sizes :) here's one where every square is four letters (ok except for the two that are three letters, i circled those for you). please gimme feedback or even riff on this idea to do it better!

some squares are ambivalent and may make a word with either the preceding square or the following ones, like:

where the square "EXAM" makes the term ORALEXAM with the previous square vs the term EXAMPLES with the next. in this case a clue for the middle square could be like: "w/ prev: speech test, w/ next: comprehension aids". now due to how crosshare works this clue is also visible from the PLES square but pls only consider the prev/bext hints relative to the first square they're for