Too much to deal with

It wasn't meant to be like that, but today I really went in without a lot of pre-planning. I read through the teacher's book over my morning coffee, and nodded my head a lot, without managing to absorb much (late night last night due to Miracle Baby C's very moving Baptism). This week's unit is all about clothes - well, trousers, hats and shoes, anyway.
The first thing that happened when I arrived (VERY stressed after a morning driving first south and then north, behind very many large and slow trucks), I was told that it was S's birthday, and so we would be celebrating.
Happy Birthday in English, of course, then I helped giving out plates, forks, cups and serviettes, and telling the children the English words for all of that. Then I served the drinks, so used "Would you like Coke or Fanta?". Going for meaning based on content, here! They got it!
After the cake, and clean-up, we got down to the lesson. My heart wasn't in it, though, after the OTHER news I got upon arrival.
The first I already knew - from September, the intermediate school will no longer have a Prima Media (the first year), but only Seconda and Terza. Which means that the students in their last year at the local primary school must now go out of town for school. They all have to do that for high school, anyway, but it is sad to lose the intermediate school, too.
The second piece of news left me numb at first. I had heard that the local primary wouldn't have its full complement of teachers from September, which meant that two of the classes would have to be combined. I figured this would be something sensible, like the first and second year combined, or the second and third. Instead, it will be the second and fourth! That is 7 year olds with 9/10 year olds.
The reason (if we can call it that) is that this year's First and Third classes are the smallest (9 in the former, not sure how many in the latter), so they are the two which can be combined from a numbers point of view.
Nothing about taking the children's learning into consideration there.
I went to a primary school where there were two years combined in each class - that is not my concern. I am concerned that they are combining two completely different levels of learning in one room. In the 2nd year, they are learning about making longer sentences, moving onto more complicated multiplication. In the 4th, they are writing compositions, and studying History.
After school (the lesson went just fine...), I talked to a friend whose daughter is the same age as mine. They go to Dance School together. She takes her daughter to school in Viterbo. I'm going to look into it. Even though I would struggle with the logistics of it, my children's education is much too important for me to muck around on this one.