Some are traditional, some are creative, some are a mouthful but they're all cute - its the annual roll call of prep students who have started school in the Ballarat region this year.
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Ballarat's cutest feature, the annual Big Steps Little Feet will be published on Wednesday, featuring the photos and names of almost every prep student from the area.
Many girls names hark back to generations past with a strong trend toward 'old fashioned' names such as Violet, Ivy, Mabel, Iris, Hazel and Florence.
Boys names take a more traditional bent with religious influences continuing with Noah, Caleb, Eli, Nathaniel or its derivative Nate, Gabriel, and Alexander all in the playground.
The recent trend of using surnames as first names was beginning to strengthen five or six years ago when the class of 2020 were born, with Copeland, Nixon, Nolan, York and Forde among this year's school starters.
McCrindle Media social researcher Rebecca Hall said celebrity names and social media were driving the trend toward more unusual and creative monikers.
"From our research we usually see a celebrity influence that drives naming trends - actors and actresses, sports stars, music stars ... and the names of their children," she said.
"Around the time these kids were born we know Penelope, Harper, Willow, Olive and Ariana for girls were celebrity-driven.
"With the rise of social media we are more exposed to what other people call their children. And many parents say if celebrities can do it, they can do it too especially if they admire that particular celebrity.
"It's become more socially acceptable to name children with names that are not traditional names."
Ms Hall said parents' desire for their child to have a unique name often saw a rapid rise and descent of a particular name.
Or they put their own tweak on an existing name.
"We have Jackson spelled three ways in our top five - Jackson, Jaxon and Jaxson. Parents like a unique element but in everyone trying to be unique it becomes common then it falls out of favour again."
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