How to dot the second of two notes

I understand that to dot the first of two, say, eighth notes, I can just select it and press the period key. The note will be dotted and the next note will become a sixteenth note. Fine. But what if I want to dot the SECOND note instead? In other words, I want the FIRST note to become the sixteenth, and the SECOND to be dotted. And I want to repeat that pattern for the whole series of eighth notes. I can’t figure out how to do that without using quite a few intermediate steps. Is there an easier way? I’m using version 3.6.2.