It depends.

Whether it's difficult to transfer from H1 to F1 or not is really hard to tell. It depnds on your situations. The fact now is it takes long time to get the result back from status trasnfer. Meaning your in-transit status while you are waiting for F1 approval is OK, but you cannot take courses formally. Anyway, there are several issues you need pay attention to:
1) Reasons to transfer from H1 to F1. They might ask you to put s statement of purpose for explanation.
2) Since H1 is dual status(that's why you apply for LC), but F1 cannot have any immigration intent. If they found out you have LC application on pending, it'll be negative for your petition to trasnfer.

Since the "zero tolerance" policy is lifted, you might still have a chance to do it. Consult with the ISO of the school you want to attend. Or apply to some schools close to US/Canadian border(both in US and Canada). And you might want to start thinking of applying for Canadian immigration. Once you are accepted to schools in US and Canada, you'll have some place to go to at least.