From framework to practice: a scalable protocol for contextualising digital teaching competence in higher education

This article presents a structured protocol for contextualising digital teaching competence (DTC) in higher education through the co-creation of discipline-specific exemplars. Rooted in the national Spanish adaptation of the DigCompEdu framework (MCDDU), the protocol was implemented with 100 university lecturers, from 34 universities, across five broad disciplinary domains. Participants collaboratively generated over 4500 contextualised examples aligned to specific DTC indicators and levels of progression. The resulting open-access catalogues illustrate how abstract competences materialise differently across epistemic cultures, providing granular and authentic reference points for professional development, training, and assessment. We describe the methodology in detail, highlight patterns of variation, and reflect on the transferability of the process to other contexts. This study contributes both a reproducible protocol and a set of discipline-sensitive artefacts that may inform scalable DTC development strategies in higher education.