Move with children to the US - no job

Hi there, checked through quite a few of the posts over the last couple of days and it appears as though my situation is unique:

I work overseas on a rotation for a non-Canadian and non-US oil company. I want to move my family down to Texas (wife and 3 young children, two of whom are in elementary school). I only have an Accounting diploma, so I don't think I can get a part time job and have a TN visa. I am actually quite content just keeping my overseas job only. My concern is, how can I move down to the states and have my children enrolled in school? Can I just go down on a temp visa of some sort and put them in a private school, or do private schools need social security numbers too? I still have the option of keeping my property (ties) in Canada so that is a variable. Any pointers would really help, as I don't have any immigration consultants in my home city.

Thanks in advance.

the kids can get student visas, but unless your wife qualifies for some sort of visa herself, I can't see how the whole family could move there legally.

ok, i was more so worried about getting the kids down there. i think i'd be able to contact a private school and then get an f1 visa prior to moving down. is this correct?

I'm sorry, I really don't know what the process is for elementary school aged children to obtain a student visa.

You may want to just make an appointment at your closest US consulate to find out what your options are.

There is no student visa for children aged under 14 except for F-3, which is for students who commute across the border regularly. The only other way is to get a derivative visa, e.g. if you are on L-1 they get L-2, if you are on TN-1 they get TD, etc.

Used to be possible for kids to attend elementary school under an ordinary B-2 visitor entry but this was stopped a few years ago.

Not sure where your rig is, but you could do the same thing in Mexico. If it's on the other side of the Gulf you could look at some of the Caribbean countries, it's not hard to get residency in the Bahamas if you take in at least $250,000 US (and a house would cost that much) and their schools are reasonably good.