Under the background of new engineering，it is of great significance to cultivate outstanding engineering and technological talents． According to the application of white light interferometer，this work explores the new teaching method by taking the Michelson interference experiment in the college physics experiment course as a sample．The white light is selected as the light source，and the principles of white light Michelson interference are deduced by combining the optical interference principle and the visibility theory of interference fringes．Simulated by Matlab，the intuitive visualization images of white light Michelson interference are obtained．Based on this，the white light interference with super-precision resolution is used to extract the topographical information of the fine surface，just like the working mode of a white light interferometer．This simulation experiment can not only assist the visual teaching of the Michelson interference experiment but also build a link between the class and practice for students，promoting the reform of the application-oriented college physics experiment curriculum．