Final answer:
Nicole needs to order 6 cakes for her graduation party to serve 108 people, by dividing the total number of guests (108) by the number of people one cake can serve (18).
Step-by-step explanation:
Nicole needs to figure out how many cakes to order for her graduation party. To solve this, we start with the information that one cake will feed 18 people. For 108 people, we can do a simple division: 108 (total number of people) divided by 18 (number of people one cake can feed). The result of this division is 6, which is the number of cakes Nicole needs to order.
Division is the mathematical operation used here. 18 people per cake is our denominator, and 108 people attending is the numerator in our division equation.
This is a straightforward example of applying division to determine quantities in real-world scenarios, similar to determining how many brownies each guest gets at a dinner party or ensuring there is enough shrimp per person at a party.