CARMEL, Ind. Strawberries, chocolate sauce and ice cream sat next to a blender on Jon Bannon's lab table at Creekside Middle School.

It was the last day of school before holiday break. Bannon's students were full of energy. Their attention spans seemed short.

But Bannon, an eighth-grade science teacher, was determined to send them off with a chemistry lesson.

He told the students they would be making heterogeneous mixtures that settle over time, which, in chemistry lingo, also are known as suspensions.

"But you can call it a milkshake," he said.

Bannon is famous for his wacky lessons that help his students love science -- and learning -- despite an accidental fire or two.

"I'm definitely the crazy science guy," Bannon said. "I'll run into people in the community who recognize me as the guy who balances bicycles on his chin."

But to his colleagues, Bannon is anything but crazy. He's a leader whose teaching style is "magical," said Creekside Principal Tom Harmas.

"He's probably one of the most creative teachers I've ever seen in my life," said Harmas, 51, who has been an administrator at four schools and a teacher at two.

Bannon, a Florida native, decided he wanted to study science after spending a summer at Yellowstone National Park following his junior year of high school.

From his time leading bike tours and working at a summer camp, he learned that children liked hands-on projects that grab their attention.

So he made it his goal as a teacher to come up with lessons that get students involved in what they were learning.

"I want my kids to go home and say, 'Hey mom! Guess what happened today? Mr. Bannon let me lay on a bed of nails!' " he said.

Students say Bannon is known as "the fun teacher."

"I didn't have a science class like this before," 13-year-old Alex Gerkerov said.

Compared to Bannon's other experiments, lying on a bed of nails and making milkshakes seem fairly tame.

"I do set my desk on fire," he said. "Several times a year, actually."

On Valentine's Day, he mixes alcohol and lithium chloride, which burns red, and pours the mixture in the shape of a heart with an arrow through it on his desk. Sometimes, he'll add heart-shaped lollipops to the design.

On St. Patrick's Day, he draws a shamrock with alcohol and boric acid, which burns green, and sets it on fire.

Bannon said the colored fires spur great questions from students, from why the chemicals burn different colors to why they don't burn his desk.

(For those who are curious: His desk is made of slate, so it doesn't burn as easily as the chemicals he uses to start the fires. In fact, he said, his desk is cool to the touch shortly after the fires go out.)

Though his desk fires have never spread, he accidentally set his ceiling on fire several years ago when he was exploding hydrogen-filled balloons.

News of the balloon fire quickly spread through the school, but Bannon is more famous for another balloon experiment: water balloon launching.

He built a water balloon launching device (think really big slingshot) that students use to learn about gravity and projectiles.

The students have to alter different factors, including the balloon's mass and the angle of the launching device, in order to hit their target: Bannon.

"I stand out there with a big red target on my chest and let them fire away," he said.

Tina Rosario, 13, said between sips of her milkshake that students learn better when they experience what they're learning, instead of reading it from a textbook.

Proof, perhaps, that Bannon's teaching style is right on target.

"It doesn't feel like you're learning," Tina said, "but you really are."

http://www.indystar.com/article/20111227/LOCAL0101/112270321/Teacher-makes-science-fun-watch-out-fires?odyssey=nav|head