Class expectations and rigor

I am really struggling with my Spanish II class. They claim they learned nothing last year and when we are reviewing conjugating verbs they don't even recognize the forms of ser. The pre-test isn't even worth wasting my time to grade because it is that bad. And then on top of it the kids are asking when we are going to have fiestas and that they had a Salina fiesta last year and a this fiesta and a that fiesta. It sounds like all they did was have fiestas.

So, I want to step up the rigor significantly but I also don't want to lose my program. It is a small school and my class sizes are already quite small. So I am really struggling to find a happy medium (enough rigor so that I'm not wasting my time but not too tough on the kids so they lose interest completely). And I understand that it is hardest with the groups of kids who are used to an easy A; once I've been around a while, things will get better.