A Note for Teachers

• Facing History & Ourselves is an educational charity providing teaching resources to help young people develop as empathetic, critical thinkers, who understand the role they can play in shaping society for the better. We believe that civic agency is developed through intellectual rigour, emotional engagement and ethical reflection. Learn more about us on our website.

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• This PowerPoint presentation has been created to be used in a KS3-4 or S1-4 assembly on LGBT+ History Month.

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• While you may need to modify this presentation to meet the needs of your students, please note that Facing History and Ourselves does not endorse your changes that alter the presentation's content or original layout.

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LGBT+ History Month

Assembly

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LGBT+ History Month

What is LGBT+ History Month and why does it matter?

Daniel James on Unsplash

#Changestartswithme

What is LGBT+ History Month?

• LGBT+ History Month takes place during the month of February.
• It is an opportunity for us to celebrate the LGBT+ community and to spotlight the struggles they still face.
• The theme for 2026 is ‘Science & Innovation’ and is a chance to learn about LGBT+ figures whose work has improved society for everyone.

Daniel James on Unsplash

Video: Why is learning

about LGBT+ history important?

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Play video

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Watch the video and think about the following questions:

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1. Why is learning about LGBT+ history important?
2. What impact does sharing this history have on people from the LGBT+ community?
3. How does telling these stories impact wider society?

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Quick Responses

• Which LGBT+ activists can you name who have worked to shape and create social change that has helped everyone?

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• Why is it important to hear their stories and celebrate their achievements?

LGBT+ Figures in Science & Innovation

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As you read the information on the following slides, think about the questions:

• What did you learn about the achievements of these figures from the LGBT+ community who supported science and innovation?
• What did you learn about the struggles they faced?
• Why is it important for their stories to be told?

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Barbara Burford (1944–2010)

• Barbara Burford was a Jamaican-British medical researcher, civil servant, diversity activist and writer.
• She led a team at the Institute of Child Health and Great Ormond Street Hospital whose work achieved breakthroughs in heart and lung transplant surgery for infants and children.
• Burford also fought for equality in the public sector, particularly in health, and established NHS equality and diversity guidelines. In 1999, Burford was appointed as Director of Equality and Diversity at the Department of Health.
• She was also a successful writer, penning plays, poetry, short stories and a novella.

Barbara Burford

Charles Beyer (1813–1876)

• Charles Beyer was a leading German-British locomotive (train engine) designer, who designed globally renowned locomotives and co-founded the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
• His path to success was not easy: he was born into a working class family in Germany, arrived in Britain penniless and faced discrimination on account of being German. However, his skill led him to considerable wealth and success.
• He had an close relationship to the Swedish Engineer Gustav Theodor Stieler, who he described as his ‘soul mate’. However, homosexuality was illegal at the time.
• He was also a philanthropist. He donated money to the University of Manchester to support working class students, and remains its biggest ever individual donor.

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Charles Beyer

Elke Mackenzie (1911–1990)

• Elke Mackenzie, born Ivan Mackenzie Lamb, was a transgender British polar explorer and botanist, who specialised in the study of lichens.
• She conducted trips to Antarctica, connecting species of lichen that were new to science.
• Nine lichen species and a headland (Cape Lamb) in Antarctica are named after her.
• Places she worked included the British Museum and the University of Harvard.
• However, she faced discrimination after she transitioned in the 1970s and had to take early retirement.

Elke Mackenzie

Jemma Redmond (1978–2016)

• Jemma Redmond was an innovator and a biotech engineer.
• She advanced technology in bioprinting (3D printing with organic material), designing a 3D printer that could work with 10 materials at once and print complex tissues, like blood vessels in organs.
• The printers she designed are currently being used for research in UK universities.
• This technology could transform countless lives by, for example, allowing humans to print organs.
• She was born intersex and one day hoped to print a 3D uterus.
• Sadly, she died unexpectedly in a tragic accident age 38.

Jemma Redmond

Robert Boyle (1627–1691)

• Robert Boyle was an Anglo-Irish chemist, physicist, inventor and philosopher.
• He was one of the first people to outline the scientific method: gaining knowledge and scientific understanding through observation, hypotheses and experiments.
• He is best known for Boyle’s law, which describes how the pressure and volume of gases are related when a temperature remains constant. An increase in pressure leads to a decrease in volume, and vice versa.

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Robert Boyle

LGBT+ Science & Technology Innovators

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Having looked at the information on the previous slides, consider these questions:

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• What did you learn about the achievements of these figures from the LGBT+ community?
• How has their work influenced the world of science and technology?
• Why is it important for their stories to be told?

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Exit Ticket

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Take a moment to think about:

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• One fact you have learnt about the different types of activism of LGBT+ individuals.

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• One fact you have learnt about one LGBT+ figure.

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• Why LGBT+ History Month is important.

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